Six Sessions
by f.f. lindy
Summary: Scully is mandated to attend six sessions of therapy with the Bureau which leads to more insight than she'd expected about her life and her relationship with Mulder. Set in season 6.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's notes:** Why, you ask, would I write a 7 chapter X-files fanfiction set in 1999? This fall I've been re-watching the X-files from beginning to end and realized that now with 15 years of life experience, there is so much I missed the first time. So, I hope you'll indulge me this one for the sake of my 15 year old self who couldn't have done it. It's by no means perfect, but I think it's better… Feedback (even critical feedback) is cherished.

Although these are by no means "post-eps" if you have nothing better to do with your time, you may enjoy reading in parallel to watching season 6. The first chapter takes place just after Terms of Endearment (6.07), and each session thereafter is set to occur between episodes throughout season 6. Each chapter notes which episode the session should follow.

* * *

 **Session 1**

 **January 5, 1999**

 **J. Edgar Hoover Building**

* * *

"Welcome, Agent Scully. Please, take a seat."

Slowly, I lowered myself down in an overstuffed chair and stared coldly at the woman in the seat across from me. My glare didn't seem to phase her and she smiled pleasantly back at me. I took a deep breath and released it audibly.

"I'm glad to see you, Agent Scully. I'm looking forward to getting to know you," the woman across from me offered.

I set my jaw and kept my gaze steely. "Thank you, Dr. Lewis, but I'm sure you realize that I'm here because I've been asked to be," I kept my tone formal and terse. I had no intention of making this easy on her.

"Please, call me Meg."

I considered telling her that I'd rather not, but I held my tongue to avoid giving her anything to scratch down on the notepad balanced on her lap. Instead, she rested her hands gently folded on top of it, pen still in hand.

"So, where do we begin?" she asked sweetly.

"Frankly," I began, "I don't have anything to say. I disagree with the fact that I'm here at all." It occurred me that there were plenty of things to talk about with a therapist, these days, but that didn't make me feel any more talkative. My eyes dared her to ask about my work, about the days I'd just spend exhuming the corpses of babies whose murderer would never be brought to justice.

She paused, as if weighing her words. "Agent Scully, I see in your records that you've spoken with Bureau therapists before. I see that you'd built a relationship with Dr. Mead a few years ago. She's working in a different capacity now, but she spoke very highly of you. Clearly, you know the value of the therapeutic process."

"And I do, when under other circumstances, but feeling coerced into therapy doesn't give me much respect for the process," my exterior remained cool, having many years of practice with my partner testing my nerves.

"Coerced?" Meg repeated.

"I've seen the documentation. I'm here because various superiors have expressed concern about my recent tendency for 'hysteria,' which as a psychologist I surely don't need to remind you suggests that my _womb_ has made me overly emotional," I could hear my tone change and my breath quicken despite my effort be calm. The last thing I wanted to do was prove them right. "My partner has on multiple occasions had outbursts far more 'hysterical' than anything I've demonstrated. I am here because I've upset my superiors and in part because I am a woman working in a male dominated organization. I think that's pretty clear. If I have to sit through six therapy sessions as a result then so be it, but don't expect me to value the therapeutic process."

I knew precisely the moments of so-called-hysteria that had wound me up here. I'd rushed Skinner's office one too many times even before we were taken off the X-files, and someone had taken notice. Then, when Mulder ran off to find a damn ghost ship in the Bermuda Triangle I had to use every ounce of my power and prowess to save him, again. This time I showed up in Kersh's office; I offered to tear Spender a new one. They couldn't suspend me for it, and now without the X-files to shut down, they couldn't even threaten that. I was already doing gopher work. They had nothing left to do to me but force me into mandated therapy. Alas, here I was.

She frowned. "I'm sorry that you feel that way, Agent Scully, and I can imagine that it's very difficult to feel marginalized and discriminated against because of your gender. We do set very different display rules in our society for men and women, and that can be upsetting." She spoke slowly and deliberately. "You don't have to agree with why you're here, and neither do I." She paused. "But what if I propose that out of respect for your time and for mine, we try to make the best use of this time we can."

I remained stubbornly silent, but she was testing my resolve.

"Is there anything you _would_ like to talk about? Since we're here?" She capped her pen and set it down with her notepad on the small table beside her, out of arms reach. It was a peace offering.

I wanted to dig my heels in. I wanted to fight her. But, she made a decent case. I had no choice but to be here and neither did she. Sitting in silence hardly seemed like the best use of my afternoon.

"Just by looking over your file I know you've had some difficult years," she said, her voice softening. "Illness, loss, changes at work, these are challenging for anyone. I'm certainly not saying that your behavior is at all out of line, even for someone who hasn't been through so much, but maybe a chance to talk about how some of these things make you feel would be good?"

I took a breath to calm myself and sought the response that would please a psychologist. I thought back to my psychiatric rotation in medical school and composed an answer. My anger had quelled a bit and I found it easier to be professional. "Yes, there have been some challenging moments, but I have a lot of social support for dealing with them and talking about them. I have a strong relationship with my family and my partner, and they've been supportive through it all. I do not need a therapist right now."

"I'm glad to hear that you have people to turn to, Agent Scully. Strong relationships are a real asset. But, sometimes a neutral party doesn't hurt. I won't have to think about anyone's interests but yours. I can just listen."

I didn't even give her a facial expression. I could be professional, but she was going to have to work for every inch.

"It doesn't have to be groundbreaking, Agent Scully," she said, her pleasant expression becoming just a bit more playful. "Did you do anything nice for the holidays?"

I thought back on my Christmas spent with Mulder, about the strange night we'd shared in what could only be described as a haunted house. I told myself when I went out there that night that I was doing it because he needed me. He didn't have anywhere to spend the holiday and would have been alone without me. That was how we'd gotten trapped. Somehow our delusions had capitalized on his loneliness and my care for him. But, then I thought about how his smile had beamed when he presented me with my Christmas gift that night, when I showed up at his apartment to find him still up, dressed, and alone on Christmas Eve. That wasn't really about his loneliness at all. I thought about how I'd curled into him and on the couch and fallen asleep, feeling like a little girl who woke up early to find Santa had come. "Yes, it was nice. More low key than most years, but nice."

"Did you spend time with your family?"

"Actually," I said cautiously, "I spent Christmas with my partner this year."

"Your partner?" she echoed.

"I know it may sound a little strange, but he doesn't have a lot of family." It was an understatement, but somehow I felt I needed to protect him. "I did go to my Mom's house for dinner," I backtracked, now seeing how much she was reading into this, "I saw my brothers and my nephews."

I'd woken up on Mulder's couch when the sky began to fill with light. I was still in my suit from the night before, his warm body next to mine and a layer of snow on the ground outside. I realized I'd missed Christmas morning. Seven o'clock under the Christmas tree for Matthew's first Christmas had come and gone. Eventually I went home, showered, and put on a sweater before driving out to my mom's house. But, I'd spend Christmas morning in his arms.

"And your family was okay with you spending a holiday with colleagues. You mentioned you were close."

"Well, it did cause a bit of tension," I said tentatively. Another understatement, to say the least. Bill had been livid. My mom broke down in tears over the dinner table. I was the skunk of the day without a doubt. It was as if no one remembered what I'd gone through the year before on Christmas. It was as if no one understood why I might not want to be around for the Scully family holiday cheer. No one realized that I would just be watching Tara play with baby Matthew longingly, thinking about my daughter and how she'd found me just a year before while I was putting on this same charade of Christmas spirit. "But, it was important to me to be there with Mulder this year."

"It sounds like you're very close. How long have you and your partner worked together?" she probed.

I knew what she was doing. I gave her two openings, my family and my work. She, incorrectly, assumed that a work relationship would be more simple than a family relationship. She couldn't bring herself to lead with "tell me about your relationship with your mother." Although I didn't like it, seeing her efforts made me let down my guard a bit. I extended an olive branch. Work seemed a safe enough topic to discuss for the time being.

"Nearly 6 years now. We worked for many years in a small sub-division called the X-files. Often we worked on cases involving unexplained and somewhat unorthodox phenomena, unsolved cases."

She tried to hide her delight that I'd offered up a piece of information she hadn't explicitly asked for, even if she did likely already have it written down in my file. "And now?" she asked.

"Our most recent assignments have been somewhat less meaningful. We work on background checks, mostly." I tried to remain calm impartial.

"That would be a disappointing transition. Your work on the X-files sounds fascinating. What did you like best about it?"

"It was challenging, and ever changing. I liked to know that we'd get to face something new and interesting every day. And, of course, I liked to feel like I was making a difference, like I was making people's lives a little safer. I felt fortunate to have work that kept me learning and let me serve people."

"That is nice. I often feel the same way about my work. It's a wonderful feeling," she said. "Sometimes the challenging cases are the most rewarding." I wondered if that was an intentional jab at my demeanor, but decided to let it go. "I can imagine that you miss the challenging work?"

"We find ways to keep busy," I said, trying not to admit to the level to which Mulder and I took insubordination. "But, yes. A challenging case can feel like a puzzle. It's like we're given these strange little details and have to piece them back together to bring someone to justice. From our very first case I found it frustratingly thrilling."

"Could you tell me a little bit about the types of cases you worked on? I'm always fascinated to hear about the work that's being done here."

"There really isn't a good example of an X-file. Often we'd investigate missing persons and deaths, but the perpetrators were seldom easy individuals to bring to justice." I paused. "Sometimes we'd investigate cases that were thought to have a link to the paranormal or supernatural. Perhaps you've heard of my partner, 'Spooky Mulder?'"

She flashed a genuine smile for a moment before pulling her face back to something more professional. "I recognize the name. You work well together?"

Of course she did. "He sees the world in a unique way, but sometimes that's exactly what we need to put the pieces together," I said clinically. "We've grown very close over the years."

"Do you think that these challenging cases helped strengthen your bond with your partner?" she asked.

"I suppose so, yes. Often, I play the role of trying to keep him in check, counterbalancing his over eagerness to believe with a more objective scientific stance. But, we've experienced enough things that simply can't be easily explained that I try to keep an open mind within the scope of science." I spoke deliberately, as I would before a jury. I couldn't help but feel that my relationship was on trial.

She nodded. "And does that cause tension?"

"It can." I admitted. "We certainly debate and question one another, but it's based in mutual respect. I think we both understand where the other is coming from, and we try to hear one another out, for the most part."

"That's terrific, and such an asset in a partnership. Sometimes, our colleagues become some of our closest allies."

I was a little surprised by the accuracy of her phrasing. Ally was an apt description. "Yes," I allowed my tone to warm, "Agent Mulder is certainly that."

"I'm sure that's wonderful for your work, and for your friendship," she began, but then paused in hesitation, "but is it every challenging personally? Sometimes close-knit cross-gendered partnerships cause tensions with romantic partners. Has that ever been an issue?"

It felt like a sneak attack, I had barely let my guard down for a second and suddenly, here we were. "No," I said. "I'm not in a romantic relationship."

"Oh," I saw her fight the urge to grab her pad to write something down, but she continued without moving for it, "and are you comfortable with that? Are you looking for a romantic partner?"

I paused to choose my words, suddenly feeling even more weary about what I said to her. She was reading me. It almost felt like she knew. "Not currently. I've dated in the past, but my professional life doesn't leave a lot of time to look for a romantic partner, much less maintain a relationship."

"That must be really difficult. It can be hard to strike a balance between the personal and the professional in our lives. But, it's really important do so. Wouldn't you agree?"

"Of course. I worry about it. But, my work is too sporadic and too dangerous to bring anyone else into the situation. I can still have meaningful relationships with people, but a romantic partner just wouldn't fit."

"Have you tried?"

"I've been on a handful of dates since leaving the academy, but never more than a first." This was heading in a dangerous direction. I began looking for a way out. I had to regain control of the conversation. "My work just doesn't leave time for people to depend on me so completely."

"Do you have any evidence of that?"

I thought about all of the evidence, about my sister, about Jack. I weighed the options. "Of course," I said. "I had a dog for about six months and even he was killed because of my work." It certainly wasn't the most salient example, but it was all I could do to redirect this discussion to something I could manage.

Her gaze shot up to me, "Killed?"

"I brought him with me on a case and he was eaten by an alligator," I said, now trying to downplay how hard it had been on me. "But, it was a reminder that what I do is dangerous, and people close to me can get hurt."

"Hmm," she nodded, her eyes again darting to her notepad and pen longingly, then back to me. "That's an interesting way of putting that. Do you think that letting people in is too dangerous for them?"

I took a sharp breath in, she wasn't going to accept the Queequeg incident alone. "Unfortunately, yes. My sister was murdered about 4 years ago because she was mistaken for me by a man who wanted me killed. A number of my good friends from over the years have been put in harm's way because of my work. I really couldn't in good conscience have a romantic partner, knowing the likelihood that he'd be hurt." Saying the words out loud was more difficult than I'd expected. I'd known it all along. This was part of the reason I'd never dated. Frankly, it was likely part of the reason that Mulder and I kept our relationship as collegial as we did.

She let a silence sit between us to be sure that I was finished. "Even with your new assignment? Wouldn't background checks be less dangerous, less time consuming, easier to balance?"

"Yes, of course," I admitted. "But I do hope that this assignment is temporary and that with time we'll be back out in the field." I realized it was a half-truth, but I couldn't dive into the whole reason for my solitude without coming across as paranoid as Mulder. I managed to pull my guard back up, "It's something I've dealt with. I'm okay with my life as it is. I have rewarding work, a terrific partner, my family. I'm okay." The words sounded hollow, even to me, like I was trying to convince myself of something rather than her. It had just been weeks ago I'd found myself worried about this, about the complete lack of a normal life, about a life I'd never have.

"And 'okay' is what you want out of life?"

I stared past her, scared to meet her eyes. "Okay is the best I can hope for right now. With all due respect, Meg, when you've been through what I have, okay is more than I really expected to have."

She seemed to sense that it was all that I could take for the moment. She knew I was a flight risk and didn't want to push it. So, she let the topic slip away. "Have you considered another pet, since the passing of your dog?"

"No, a dog would be great, but it's just not practical right now. Work pulls me out of town at the last minute and I can't be there for a pet. I loved the companionship, but it was difficult logistically."

"What kind of dog did you have? You know, some breeds are easier to care for."

"He was a little Pomeranian, not at all the kind of dog I would have picked out for myself. But, I sort of inherited him."

"Oh? From whom?"

"Actually a man we met on a case who passed away suddenly," saying it out loud made me realize how absurd it was that I brought home this strangers dog. But, he didn't feel like a stranger at the time.

When I looked up, her mouth was downturned. "It was kind of you to take him in."

"I was young," I said, as if it were an excuse for my behavior.

"So what kind of dog would you have picked out if you hadn't inherited little…" she waited for my input.

"Queequeg," I finished.

"Queequeg," she smiled. "Like from _Moby Dick_?"

I nodded, unable to keep the corners of my mouth from upturning slightly. Just the words reminded me of better times, of my dad reading me Moby Dick before bed, of reading it to myself in my college dorm room when I was homesick, of sitting on a rock on the shore of a Georgia lake with Mulder and hearing him quote Moby Dick to me. His voice was warm and raspy. It was one of those moments that I knew my life was turning in a direction I'd never expected, like I'd lost control of the ship. I took a minute to savor the memory before responding, "Yes, my father used to read it to me when I was a little girl."

"I can see how highly you think of him by that look on your face," she said.

"We were very close. He um," I wondered why I was saying the words as the came out of my mouth, "he passed away not long after I started work on the X-files."

"I'm so sorry to hear that. Losing a parent is so difficult."

I nodded in agreement. "It is, but I know now that it's just a part of the process. Just like anything else difficult in life. Parents die and pets die. I face death every day in my work. I'm learning to be more comfortable with it." Again, the words that I didn't speak said much more than those that I did. I thought about how many moments I'd been faced with my own death, about the number of times I'd thought that I'd reached my end both at work and laying in a hospital bed. I thought of Emily, and the pain of watching your child be taken from this world, but knowing that everything is put on this Earth marching towards some end.

"That's very brave, Agent Scully, and wise."

"It's the nature of the work," I said, trying to keep my tone professional.

She smiled gently in a way that made this feel more and more like a genuine conversation and less like a mandated therapy session. Again, she knew it was time to leave a topic, rather than risk upsetting me again. "Have you thought about a cat? I hear from a lot of agents that cats are easier to balance with a busy work schedule. They are more independent. They can be left alone more."

"I'm not really a cat person," I said.

She let out a chuckle. "Of course not. Let me guess, you want a big dog, a Collie or Shepard?"

"A Great Dane if I had my druthers."

"Oh, Agent Scully, think what you will, but I think we're going to have a good time together, whether you're forced to be here or not." Her eyes flicked to the clock on the wall, and back, causing me to do the same. I hadn't noticed that 45 minutes had passed since I'd arrived. The therapeutic hour was over. "So, should we schedule your next session?"


	2. Chapter 2

**Session 2**

 **January 25, 1999**

 **J. Edgar Hoover Building**

(Set after Tithonus 6.10)

* * *

"Agent Scully," she greeted me warmly. "I'm so glad to see you. How are you feeling?"

"Fine," I said, making my way to the chair I knew she expected me to sit in.

"Thanks for coming. I worried when I heard you were in the hospital. Is everything alright?"

"Yeah, I'm making good progress towards recovery." I didn't want to recount the story. It wouldn't do much for my case that I was level-headed and emotionally stable. I wanted to scream it. I was still infuriated by it all, even now, weeks later.

"What happened?"

"I was shot while in the field on a case," I said curtly.

"On a background check?" she asked with disbelief.

"No, I was investigating a murder suspect in New York."

"Oh? How did it happen?" she ask gently.

"I was inadvertently shot by the other agent on the case." I didn't match her tone. I couldn't speak gently of it.

"That must have been scary and upsetting," she said. Then she asked tentatively, "By your partner?"

"No," I shook my head. "I was assigned to work with an agent out of the New York office on this case and he," I paused trying to hide the distain my voice, "he made a rash choice."

"I'm so sorry to hear it. I'm glad to see you back on your feet."

"Thank you," I said.

"So, I assume the reassignment isn't a permanent one?"

"No," I said a bit too quickly, "not at all. It was just for the one case. I'm already back to background checks with Agent Mulder."

"And how are you feeling about that? I know last session you mentioned that you miss the challenge of a field assignment."

"I do," I said cautiously, "but I am lucky to have a partner I work well with, and would struggle with being assigned to work with someone else. I think this case reminded me of how important it can be to have a partner with similar values." I hoped that would suffice to say what I meant: I would rather clean toilets with Mulder than chase murderers with a scumbag.

"You know, that reminds me, since I have you here, I was hoping I could ask your opinion on a project I'm working on."

"Of course, if I can help," I offered.

She picked up her notebook and pen, "I have a client, another young woman like yourself, who has been assigned a new partner and she is really struggling with the situation. She feels like he doesn't respect her work because she's a woman and she just can't let herself open up to him. We've tried a couple of therapeutic strategies, but I'm really struggling to help her. I couldn't help but think of our last session and how highly you spoke of Agent Mulder. I wondered if you might be able to offer some advice. What types of things did you do to build your relationship early on?"

I paused to think back on my early days in the X-files, when I was young and naïve and Mulder was, well, Mulder. "Well, I think part of it is just who he is. There are certainly agents in this organization that would be difficult to work with because of what they value. While of course I'd like to think that all agents have the same goals that I do for my work and what it means, I am sometimes reminded that it's not necessarily the case. Part of why Mulder and I work well together is because we value the same end."

"So there was an immediate simpatico?" she asked.

I paused thinking back on our first meeting. Simpatico was most certainly not the feeling I would have used to describe our connection. "When I was first assigned to work with Agent Mulder we did butt heads a bit. He didn't know if he could trust me and I was pretty green. But, it was on our first case together that I think we realized how much we had in common where it mattered. We sort of clicked, if that makes sense." I relived the feeling of standing the pouring rain beside him, laughing because I didn't know what else to do. "It wasn't all roses. He tried at first to keep me out of his business, and to this day has a habit of ditching me and getting himself into hot water, but…" in my minds eye I saw myself wrapped up in a robe on the bed of his hotel room on a rainy night in Oregon. I'd known him less than a week and already had a sense that I could trust him. If he was willing to show me his deepest and darkest, to trust me with his truth, I could do the same. "I guess he saw that he could trust me when I showed him my vulnerability. So, he showed me his."

She smiled pleasantly, "Vulnerability, that's an important word. It can be really scary to make yourself vulnerable."

I nodded, processing my own feelings in my mind. "Yeah."

"But it's the only way to really connect, isn't it Agent Scully?" Suddenly it felt odd that she was still addressing me so formally. "Vulnerability is the key to intimacy."

I was a bit startled by her word choice. I'd taken enough psychology in college to know that intimacy had meanings that had nothing to do with physical intimacy, but it still surprised me a bit. I couldn't help but question her motive just a bit when I repeated. "Intimacy?"

She smiled warmly and looked like she might almost laugh. "I know, it's a not a word we like to associate with people we work with. But, it's really something that I try to work with a lot of agents on, and something I can see you understand instinctively. In fact, it's the advice I gave my other client. Your partner has to be someone you're willing to open up to. That's really what intimacy is all about, isn't it? Being willing to share something with a person that you wouldn't necessarily share with anyone else. When you're responsible for someone else's life on a day to day basis, intimacy and trust are critical. "

I nodded, but still felt odd about it. The word was so resonant, so perfectly suited to the relationship she was describing, but I felt so uncomfortable about the fact that it was. I wondered if she was hinting at something or if I was being paranoid.

"You look perplexed Agent Scully."

"It's strange to hear you talk about it that way. I feel like Mulder and I have to constantly remind everyone that our relationship isn't a romantic one. The roomer mill seems to have some story about us every time I turn around, and people just assume all the time that we're romantically involved." I thought about Sheila and her disbelief that Mulder and I weren't together, about the jokes that Agent Ritter had cracked about the relationship he assumed I had with Mulder. "It's exhausting to have to defend our friendship as often as we do. I could never quite figure out why," I paused. "I guess it's because we share a lot with each other that we don't share with anyone else. And you're right, that's just intimacy. I get so upset, in that regard, that people can't delineate between intimacy and romance. But then, when you said intimacy I did the same thing."

She nodded thoughtfully. "That's insightful, Agent Scully. We often do assume that intimacy between a man and woman means something sexual or romantic. I think often it keeps cross-gendered partners from developing the type of relationship that will help them succeed. You're very brave to be willing to cultivate an intimate relationship, knowing that you'll face that stigma. I wish that I could help more of my clients do it." She paused and thought for a moment. "Have you and Agent Mulder ever been to one of our team building seminars?"

A smile played across my lips. "No, we've never quite been able to make it to one. I guess our team building style has been a little more organic." Mulder would have appreciated the pun, but it was lost on Meg.

"Really? With the way that you talk about your partnership it sounds like you should be leading them. In fact, there's a short training process, but we offer stipend for partners who are willing to help lead retreats. We are always looking for competent new trainers."

I tried my best to hold back the laugh but my face deceived me and a grin broke across my face. "I don't think that's something Agent Mulder and I would be very good at." I made a mental note to recount his story to Mulder later. The look on his face alone would make this session worthwhile.

"Well, think about it. I think you could bring a fresh perspective."

I was still trying to smother my smile. "We'll discuss it."

She smiled widely. "So, clearly you didn't have formal training to make your professional relationship work. How did you learn to communicate and work as a team?"

I thought about it again and searched for the mechanisms, but nothing came to mind. "I don't think there's anything special that we did," I began. "Like I mentioned, we connected right away, and have skills that really complement one another's. But I think it was just spending a lot of time together, building that trust."

"Yes, how did you do that?" she coaxed.

Paused to gather my thoughts, analyzing my relationship with Mulder in a way I wasn't often called upon to do. "So often," I felt myself soften as I though about him and didn't fight it back, "it feels like it's us against the world. The things we see together, the things that happen, the challenges we face, it's almost like they bring us closer together. Sometimes it feels like he's the only person who is on my team, like we share a common enemy. And that person, the one person who stands beside you to face the rest of the world- that person becomes your everything." I knew I'd said too much, but the words were flowing now. "It's strange, we'd be working together for over 4 years when I got sick. And it wasn't really until then that I realized how much I rely on him. It wasn't until I couldn't tell him everything, that I realized how much I depend on being able to tell him everything."

"When you were sick?" she repeated.

I was taken aback for a moment, called back to the context I was in. "I'm sorry, I assumed it was my records."

"I noticed that you've had a good deal of Illness and Recovery Leave, but assumed much of it was work related. Were you quite ill?"

It shouldn't have surprised me, of course. The less record of what they'd done to me the better in their opinion. I let silence sit between us for a moment before I spoke. "I was diagnosed with a nasal pharyngeal tumor in early 1996."

"I'm so sorry to hear that."

"It was difficult," I said, now conserving my words. I'd said too much just a moment before.

"And your prognosis?"

"It wasn't good. The tumor was inoperable, and similar cases hadn't responded to chemo and radiation."

"Oh," she said, a look of concern on her face.

"For the most part I felt fine. We monitored it for months before it metastasized and spread to my blood. There were times when I really didn't know for sure I would make it," I said, recounting story I'd already told too many times, "But, through some miracle, and very good care, it went into remission." It was a line I had practiced and rehearsed. No mention of a microchip in my neck. No mention of the doctor who tried to kill me.

"I'm so sorry for what you went through. But now you're in recovery?"

"Remission," I said cautiously. "I've recovered, and we don't have any reason to think that it will come back, but technically, remission."

"I'm glad to hear that."

"I feel very fortunate." I said, "In a way, it sort of feels like I was given a second chance." I felt myself opening up to her, and I couldn't seem to make it stop. I thought about my recent conversation with Fellig about mortality. He spoke like a man who knew a lot about life, but had never really faced his own death in the way that I had. Anyone who had come so close to death would have a greater respect for life, it seemed to me.

"A second chance for what?"

"A lot of things changed after the cancer. I think in some ways being sick made me look at the choices I'd made differently."

"With regret?" she asked, as if reading my mind.

"No, not regret," I shook my head. "There were times when I questioned my decision to join the FBI, when I saw how committed I've become to my work and wondered if I'd made the wrong decision. But, generally it just made me want to make more of an effort to connect with people. I went back to the Church. I make an effort to spend more time with people I care about. I started to see my work differently. When I first found out I was sick I even went on date, the first in years."

My mind wandered to the other things I'd let myself do, the decisions I'd made in the wake of my illness and recovery, the feeling of his weight over me and his fingers exploring my body, the terrifying thrill of breaking every rule, throwing every caution into the wind. I couldn't talk about that, not here. I shook the images from my head and tried to focus back in on the conversation.

"Post-traumatic growth is the best outcome we can possibly hope for in the face of adversity, Agent Scully. I am always so pleased when people are able to make meaning, to change their lives for the better as a result of a challenge. I think this is really something that we could work on."

I sorted her words in my mind. I'd never really thought of it in those terms, and I was uneasy about the idea of 'working' on anything here.

"Do you think that is a goal that we could set for our time together? To talk more about ways to bring more love, and more connection into your life? It sounds like you've made some strides already, but I'd be honored to get to help you continue that growth."

I thought about getting up and running for the door, but somehow, I didn't. Love was too important. So, I nodded. "Okay," I said tentatively.

"Well, that's not the enthusiastic response I could have hoped for, but I'll take it."

A smile cracked my somber face. "It's more than I planned to give you."

"In that case I suppose I should just be pleased." She laughed softly. "Are there any relationships in particular that you'd like to work on or strengthen?" she probed.

I thought about my life for a moment. What relationships did I have left? It hadn't been that long ago that my weekends were full of weddings and baby showers, but as of late, they'd been quiet. I saw my mom, I saw Mulder, I talked to Tara on the phone from time to time, but she'd been busier and busier with Matthew growing. I had no answer to the question; I had no relationships left. I felt myself grasping at straws. "There are some nice women in my running group," I said, "it would be nice to get to know them better."

"Oh, you're in a running group?" she looked pleasantly surprised.

"Twice a week when I'm in town," I said. "It can be hard to find the time to get to the gym otherwise."

"How long have you been doing that?"

"On and off since I came to this office from Quanitico. It's a nice group of people, mostly professional women."

"So you can relate to them?"

"For the most part. There's a lot of turnover. People move in and out of things in this city. And, I guess running groups only appeal to a certain demographic. When people's lives change they don't have as much time."

She paused. "How so?"

"You know," I began, "people get married, they have children, they buy houses in the suburbs. Life changes when you do those things and you have less time to devote to the things that you did when you were young and single."

"And to the people you knew then?" she probed.

"To a certain extent, yes."

"Is that something that you feel the impact of sometimes," she asked, "not just in the running group but in other parts of your life?"

"Of course," I said, "especially in these past couple of years. When I was 30 there were still plenty of other women my age who weren't married or even looking for a partner, but now," I took a breath, wondering why I was telling her all of this, "there aren't many of us left by 35. Most of my friends from college have little ones. We try to stay connected, but it can be difficult."

"I'm sure it is," she said. She looked like she was thinking deeply, so I gave her silence. "In the spirit of our goal, I'd like to give you a homework assignment," somehow as she said it, she'd made me aware of the clock. We'd made our way through 45 minutes again.

"Homework?" I repeated, making no effort to hide my incredulity.

"I promise it won't be too hard, Agent Scully. Just sometime over the next two week I want you to call up an old friend and just talk. Reminisce and get caught up on what is going on, and try to savor that conversation," she said. "Do you know what I mean by savor?"

"I think so," I said. I wanted to roll my eyes at her and tell her that this was absurd. I certainly didn't need to be assigned by a therapist to call a friend. But then, as I tried to rack my brain and think about the last time I'd taken the time to do it, I couldn't remember the last proper catch up I'd had with a friend.

"Just let go of anything else going on. Don't think about work or your next manuscript. Just savor the moment, enjoy how it feels to reconnect. Will you do that for me?"

"Okay," I said. "I'll try."

"I'm going to hold you to that, Agent Scully," she said with a smile.


	3. Chapter 3

**Session 3**

 **February 16, 1999**

 **J. Edgar Hoover Building**

(Set After One Son 6.12)

* * *

"How have you been Agent Scully?" Meg asked as I took my seat.

"I've been well," I said, although it was a lie. I'd been through the wringer. I'd been one wrong move away from burned to death, again. I'd watched my partner place his trust in someone capable of unspeakable evil. Despite my encouragement that the week's atrocities would lead us back to the X-files, I felt betrayed and scared of a future I couldn't control.

"And work?" she asked.

I wondered how much she'd heard through the gossip mill. Surely she'd heard about Spender, Bureau therapists had to keep up on deaths to be prepared to help with grief. But had she heard about our censure and dismissal? About our re-admittance in the wake of a gruesome mass murder? Our reassignment onto the X-files? "It's been a challenging couple of weeks. But, Agent Mulder and I have been reassigned to the X-files." I tested the waters.

"Well I'm sorry to hear that it's been difficult, but that's certainly a positive conclusion to it. Would you like to talk about it?"

"No," I said as calmly, yet firmly as I could. "It's difficult to explain, and frankly I haven't entirely made sense of all that happened yet."

"Were you and Agent Spender close?" she probed. Apparently she'd at least heard part of the story.

"We'd worked together briefly," I said. "Of course his death came as a shock." I decided that I would rather she think I was grieving Spender than know the truth, about Cassandra, about Mulder.

"I'm sorry for your loss."

"It's really alright," I said, feigning emotion just a bit. "I've coped with many deaths, of family, of colleagues, I know it's a part of the work."

"Have you and Agent Mulder discussed it?" she asked.

"Of course. He knew Agent Spender as well, so we processed it together." This, I told myself, was not a lie. We'd discussed Spender's death in great length. Of course, we hadn't talked about our feelings, but we'd discussed the how and the why, the details that no doubt Meg hadn't even considered.

"It's nice that you have someone to turn to at these times."

"Yes," I said. I couldn't let her know that there had been moments in the past few weeks that my confidence in him had wavered, that there were times when I thought I'd lost him for good to Diana's games.

"Are you sure that you don't want to discuss what happened?"

"Much of it is classified," I said. "I can't discuss it.

"Oh," she said understandingly. Apparently I'd found the magic word. "Last session we ended with a little homework assignment," she said. "How did that go?"

It seemed like a lifetime ago, now, that she'd asked me to catch up with an old friend. I'd fully intended to do it. I was going to call Ellen. But, as usual the X-files had gotten in the way. I cataloged my week quickly, looking for some way out. "I was actually able to meet up with an old friend in person," I said, thinking of my conversation with Cassandra. Surely that should count.

"Terrific. And were you able to enjoy the chat, let go of other things and savor it?"

Perhaps that was a stretch. "To a certain degree," I said. "It was a challenging time at work. But it was very nice to get caught up."

"How did that feel?"

I paused to think. "It was a relief, really. She's one of those people who just makes you feel more comfortable just to be around her."

Meg smiled. "That's so nice. Were you able to get away just the two of you? Does she have children?"

"She's quite a bit older than I am. Her son is grown and out of the house. So, we were able to have some one-on-one time." I silently applauded myself for now normal I was making all of this sound. To Meg, it was as if I had just met an old friend for coffee to talk about the weather.

"I'm so glad to hear that. I know it can be difficult when people have little ones at home to be able to get away for things like that. It sounds like you made a good choice in who you met up with.

The comment made me feel a little guilty. I hadn't exactly initiated all of this, but it had happened none the less.

She seemed to sense my guilt, but luckily misinterpreted it. "It can be harder, sometimes, when people are very busy. But you know, I'm sure your friends with very full lives miss you, too."

It was a little challenging for me to believe. I hadn't spoken with Ellen, the mother of my Godson, in almost a year. One by one my friends had gotten married, gotten pregnant, and disappeared. It was as if they'd decided to trade in my friendship for a newer model—one with children. "Perhaps," I said, "but I understand, once people have a spouse and kids their priorities have to change. They have to put their kids first. It can just be hard to be the friend without kids. It can feel like all of a sudden the people you used to rely on are gone." It felt odd saying these things out loud. I hadn't said them to anyone before, not even Mulder.

"I'm sorry you feel that way," she said. "But I think those are common emotions. I speak with many women, especially professional women, who have chosen not to have children, or have decided to wait to have children, and many of them say the same thing. It's an unfortunate consequence in our society." She paused. "Have you thought about having children, Agent Scully?"

"Yeah," I said softly, "I always thought that I wanted children, someday. I was never in a rush."

"And you still think you will?"

I weighed my options, trying to decide how much to disclose. "I learned," I began, swallowing a lump in my throat and starting again. "After my cancer went into remission I learned that my illness had left me infertile."

She paused and looked deeply saddened. "I'm so sorry."

I pressed my lips tightly together and nodded. "It's been hard, but I've come to terms with it."

There were so many moments bouncing around in my mind as I spoke those words. How could I express how hard it had been, what hard meant to me? Hard was watching my brother's wife bring a perfect little son into the world and knowing I never could. Hard was having to tell my mom and ruin the one dream for me that she still had left. Hard was sitting across the table from a judge while Mulder explained that he'd known seemingly before I did about my ova, about my inability to conceive a child. It had cut me so deeply. It had brought up every emotion from the days leading up to my own discovery of the knowledge just a couple weeks prior. It made me question our relationship, our honesty, our trust. Good god it had been hard.

I remembered the moment with my feet in stirrups that the doctor told me that something was unusual and would require an ultrasound. It hadn't even crossed my mind, then, what that might mean. In that moment I though that it meant a false negative on the pregnancy test I'd taken earlier that month. My periods has been spotty since I was abducted, and even more so since the cancer. I hadn't had one since I gotten home from the hospital and done, for the first time in a long time, what could have gotten me pregnant. I imagined, perhaps hopefully, that the ultrasound would reveal the fluttering heart beat of a six week old embryo. "Am I pregnant?" I'd asked, feeling simultaneously terrified and elated by what that would mean. "No, Dana," my doctor had said, softly. Something in her tone told me she meant something much worse, that perhaps it was more cancer. The ultrasound, I quickly concluded was to look for the tumor. I had no idea, then, as I was enduring a pap smear so that I could ask my gynecologist for birth control pills- for just in case by some stroke of luck the thing that had happened six weeks ago was not a one-time occurrence- that 'something unusual' didn't mean cancer. It meant my ovaries were gone.

"I'm sure it has been hard," Meg said somberly, pulling me from my thoughts. "Infertility, Agent Scully, can be one of the most painful things for a woman to face. It's not unusual to feel that way. Coming to terms with it can take years, a lifetime even. You don't have to be strong for me." She paused, to let me respond.

She'd seen right through my façade of strength. I nodded slightly.

"Would you like to talk about how it makes you feel?"

"I have had a lot of time to think about it, Meg," I said. "Of course it's upsetting, but perhaps it's for the best. I don't have a husband to have a child with. I have work that would make it difficult. I'm lucky to have work that means to so much to me." This was all my own rationalization, things I'd brainstormed to tell myself on lonely nights to make the dissonance and hurt go away.

"There are many ways to have a child without a husband, Agent Scully. Have you considered alterative methods? Adoption for instance?" She offered, clearly trying to be helpful.

I sucked in air as I nodded. The conversation was only going to get harder. How could I tell her about Emily? "Not long after my cancer went into remission I visited my brother and his family in San Diego for Christmas. I got myself wrapped up in a case while I was there and met a little girl who had been recently orphaned by her adoptive parents. I felt it the moment I saw her…" I paused, trying to reframe the story. I couldn't talk about aliens or government conspiracy. I couldn't talk about abduction. "I don't think I'll ever know how, or why," I said, swallowing hard again and staring at the carpet in front of me, "but she was biologically my daughter. I checked the lab results myself."

For the first time, Meg looked genuinely shocked, as if no amount of clinical training could prepare her for this. She nodded, trying to encourage me to speak, because I'd rendered her speechless.

"After her parents passed away I applied to legally adopt her. Even though I could prove that I was biologically her mother, my application was rejected." I felt the rims of my eyes begin to burn and tried to hold back my emotion. "I'm a single woman who is overcommitted to a dangerous job. It didn't matter how much I loved her." I blinked rapidly to try to stop the tears threatening to fall and inhaled a ragged breath. "I never though I'd be an unfit mother," I shook my head a bit, the corners of my mouth upturning at the sheer absurdity of the words coming out of my mouth, "but it's the truth. I'll never be able to adopt a child. I can't even take care of a Pomeranian."

"Dana," she said softly, then began to backpedal, "is it alright that I call you Dana?"

I nodded wordlessly.

"Dana, having your application rejected once does not make you an unfit mother, and I think you know that. What they were saying was that at the moment, you didn't have space in your life for a child. But you could make space. Just like you made space for Queequeg, you could make space for a child. You'd have to change the way that you interact with your work, you'd have to change your priorities, and yes, it would be easier if you had someone to share the load, whomever that may be. But, you are not unfit. You just weren't ready then. If a child is really what you want, you'll find a way."

I pressed my lips tightly together and nodded, knowing that if I were to so much as breathe deeply my diaphragm would begin to spasm and tears would begin to fall.

"Maybe adoption isn't the right route for you. But, there are ways to get pregnant even for people who struggle with fertility, with or without a partner. Have you considered in vitro fertilization?"

I nodded again, still not ready to speak. Despite my normal tendency for problem-focused coping, I couldn't handle it right now. I couldn't try to problem solve.

She seemed to pick up on my discomfort. I saw her expression soften. "Would you like to tell me about your daughter? What is her name?"

I closed my eyes for a moment to compose myself. "Her name was Emily. She was 3 when I met her. Quiet and shy, but so sweet. She was the spitting image of my sister, when she was young," I began wistfully. "She had blond hair and pretty blue eyes, she would have been beautiful. All the time we got together was in the hospital or a group home in San Diego, but even that was so special. She was so special." I paused to think about her, about her smile, and her spirit.

"Are you still able to stay in touch with her?"

I inhaled a ragged breath. "She was very sick. The doctors did all that they could but she took a turn for the worse. She passed away just a few weeks later."

"Were you able to be there with her?"

I nodded, remembering back to holding the hand of my sweet daughter as she took her final breaths. "I wish I'd gotten to see her grow up, to see her turn into a young woman who could teach me things. I wish that I could have taken her to the National Zoo and fought with her about it when she was 8 and wanted her ears pierced but I didn't think she was ready." I smiled at the thought. "I think about her every day."

"I'm sure you do, Dana. It is very special that you got to have the time with her that you did, that you got to be there with her at the end."

I nodded. "I know," I said, unable to avoid calling to mind the moment in the church when Mulder had reminded me of the same thing.

"And your family, they were supportive?"

I sighed deeply. "They struggled, I think, to understand. It's hard for people sometimes who haven't been through the same things we have to understand our realities. I think even with the DNA result, they didn't fully understand that she was mine, and how much I loved her."

"But they were there for you?"

"In their own way," I said softly. "They were there in the only ways they knew how." Again, I felt myself nearing tears. "I barely had two weeks with her. It wasn't long enough for them to come to love her. But, I know they would have."

"I'm sure they would have, too, Dana. Your family sounds very special."

I nodded in agreement.

She began again. "But it can be difficult when our family doesn't fully understand our strife. Sometimes as adults we turn to others to fill that space. It must have been difficult to be in San Diego without your support network here."

I knew what she was asking, despite the fact that no question came out of her mouth. "Mulder flew out to San Diego as soon as I let him know."

"And he got to meet her?"

"Yes," I said softly. "He was there with us, in the hospital. He did all that he could to try to help her."

"He understood what your family couldn't?"

"I think so," I could hear my voice still threatening to give way. "He was kind to her, and protective," I said, trying to turn to a lighter note. "It reminded me of case we were on, about a year before I met Emily. We were investigating an infanticide, which are always difficult, and the examination of the body was even more so. He told me afterwards that he'd never seen me as a mother before then. He called me 'Mom' all week," I let a small smile form on my lips, thinking back to our banter, even back then. "At the time I didn't really know what he meant, I sort of just thought he was teasing me. But when we were out there in California, in the hospital with Emily, I think I realized what he meant. I had never really thought of him as a father before that. But he was fatherly to her."

"Why do you think that is?"

"Why was he being that way? I suppose because he saw her as an extension of me, and felt like he had to be."

"Is he protective of you?" she asked.

"We're partners. We watch out for one another. I know that he'd do anything for me. I've seen it, the lengths he's gone to to save me, the times he's put himself in danger for me. I think he would have done the same for Emily."

"Do you think that in some way, he saw Emily as his daughter as well?"

I inhaled a sharp breath and held it for a moment, then closed my eyes for a long blink before opening them again to focus on her. "It's possible, yes." I thought back to the awkward moment in the hospital, when we'd been addressed as Emily's parents. I thought, just for an instant that he was going to say yes. When he'd uncomfortably shuffled away to watch her through the window I thought about reaching out to him. I felt like I should have been the one to speak on his behalf, but then, I wasn't even really in place to be speaking on my own behalf. It was a moment I've played over and over in my head.

"How did that make you feel? Did you feel comfortable with his playing that role?"

"I guess I was, yes," I said cautiously. "It was a comfort to know he was there, that he was on my team. It made me feel more safe to have someone else watching out for her, too," I said, feeling like I was improvising. I had never really asked myself that question in the moment. "It was sweet to see him seem to care about her, and at that point, he was the closest thing she had to a father."

Meg paused, perhaps to consider that last phrase. "Have you ever talked with Agent Mulder about your desire to have children?" She was really digging in, and somehow I found myself compelled to answer.

"Never formally, no. I mean it's come up from time to time on a case, but never in earnest."

"Do you think he would be supportive of your decision if you did decided to?"

I paused and considered that myself. I'd always expected that he would be. "He was so worried about me when I told him I wanted to adopt Emily. He was afraid that she was so sick, that she was just going to be taken from me," I said, "but I know that if I were to make the decision to try he'd support me. He'd do whatever he could to help. That's just the way he is."

"It sounds like he really cares about you, Dana."

"Yeah, he does," I said. It felt a little strange to admit aloud.

"And you're comfortable with that?" she asked.

"I guess so," I said non-committedly.

She nodded and flicked her eyes to the clock beside me and back. "I want to thank you," she said, "for your honesty today. I'm sure these were challenging thing to discuss and I appreciate your sharing."

"It was good," I said. "Thank you."

"Can we schedule our next visit?" she asked.


	4. Chapter 4

**Session 4**

 **February 26, 1999**

 **J. Edgar Hoover Building**

(Set after Agua Mala 6.13)

* * *

"Dana, great to see you," Meg greeted me warmly. She took her seat as I sat down in mine. I was beginning to feel more comfortable in the space and allowed myself to cross one leg underneath me as I sat.

"Good to see you, too," I said pleasantly. For as opposed as I'd initially been to these visits, I was coming to appreciate them more than I'd anticipated, at least.

"How is work?" she asked, beginning with small talk. I'd come to recognize the pattern.

"It's been busy as ever," I said, falling into it myself.

"Yeah, any particularly interesting X-files lately?" she asked with a flash of a smile.

"We were in Florida last week on a case and got caught in the hurricane. Actually, I delivered my first baby," I left out the details about the sea monster. She only needed so much.

"My gosh, I heard that there were fatalities in that storm. Was everyone okay?"

"Mom and baby were healthy," I said.

"Until you mentioned that, I'd forgotten you were a physician, Dana. Does your medical training come in useful much in your work?"

"Far more than I'd like it to, sometimes" I said.

"Really, how so?"

"In the field there are so many incidents. It's nice to have the medical background to help when I can and bring my own medical perspective. Beyond that," I began with a deep exhale, "my training at Quantico was in forensic medicine, so I perform a lot of autopsies and examine a lot of corpses."

"Are those difficult for you?"

"No, actually I find it to be much easier in a lot of ways. Autopsies allow us to tell the story of what happened to someone. They make a body into evidence to help bring some justice to the victim. It can be much harder to watch someone suffering, even when you're trying to help." I considered telling her that while this was the first life I'd brought into the world, I'd see all too many leave.

"I had never thought of it quite that way. Is that what drew you to forensic medicine?"

I paused. "No, not really. When I started med school I thought I was going to do medical genetics, actually. I wanted to do research, to cure disease. But then the closer I got to graduation less certain I was that it was really what I wanted to do. I was recruited by the FBI and went straight to Quantico after graduation to finish my training. It just seemed right at the time," I shook my head slightly, thinking about my 26 year old self, feeling so lost.

"And does it still?"

"Like I said, I love my work. It's not at all what I thought I'd be doing. But, I wanted to make a difference, and I really do feel like I get to do that here."

"Do you ever think about other possibilities?" she asked, as if intuiting my hesitation.

"In terms of my career? Of course. When the X-files were suspended temporarily a few years ago they sent me to Quantico, and I really enjoyed my work there. Teaching was fulfilling. It felt good to mentor the next generation of agents."

"Do you ever think about going back medicine?"

"From time to time. I think I would enjoy it, now that I'm a little more distanced from my training, now that I've seen a little more of the world. My father was never really pleased that I took the route that I did. He'd been so proud when I started medical school. That's no doubt part of why I did it. I wanted to make him proud."

"And do you think that he was less proud because you joined the FBI?"

"I used to think so, but when he passed away I guess I…" I smiled slightly, thinking about him, "I had to believe that he really was proud of where I ended up."

"I'm sure he was, Dana. You talk about him like he was special man."

"He was," I said softly. "He was a captain in the Navy and ran the house like his ship. He was strict, but I loved him so much; I thought that he hung the moon. We were so close when I was a little girl, it made it hard when I grew up, sometimes, to make my own choices. I went to medical school to please him, but I just knew it wasn't right. My parents were so mad when I decided to join the FBI. I think they thought it was an act of rebellion."

"Was it?" she asked. I was a little surprised at her question.

"I guess in some ways, it was," I admitted. "I wanted to blaze my own trail, not be the perfect daughter for once."

"You saw yourself that way?"

"I tried," I said, releasing a deep breath. "I tried to be the perfect little Starbuck for my dad, but it was just too much sometimes. I loved him so much, I worshiped him. But I couldn't let him make that decision for me. I had to show him that I was an adult and could make my own choices."

"It can be a really hard lesson to learn, Dana, learning to let go of our parents plans for us."

I nodded. "When I was 12 my parents picked us up and moved us to San Diego. I was so mad that they made me leave all my friends, my middle school. I got a little rebellious streak, by 13 started talking back to him and wearing crop tops and smoking my mom's cigarettes when no one was looking. It was ridiculous looking back on it now, but at the time I though I was so bad. I was really going to show them," I let out a chuckle. "I had to show my dad that I wasn't a little girl he could just tell what to do anymore."

"And did it work?"

"Well, 10 years later I ended up in medical school, so you tell me?"

She smiled. "Our relationships with our parents can really set a course. It's completely normal. I can't tell you the number of agents I talk to who are here because it was what their parents wanted for them, somehow. A girl's relationship with her father in particular seems to really have an impact."

I must have released a deeper sigh than I'd thought, either that or my face betrayed me, because she immediately followed up.

"You can relate to that, I take it?" I nodded in silent agreement. "Perhaps not so much in your work as in your relationships?" she probed.

"I know it's cliché, but yes, I've had a few relationships that have paralleled my relationship with my father with uncanny accuracy."

"Recent relationships?"

"Not exactly, no," I began. "I guess the first was my junior year of college. I was in an advanced physics class with this bright, talented young post-doc. I had a boyfriend at the time, but I swear every time I walked into the classroom I just went starry eyed," I grimaced at my younger self.

Meg let out a supportive chuckle.

"I started dressing up to go to his office hours and studying for his class an extra hour a day so I could be the top of the class. I knew he was single and I all but threw myself at him," I shook my head. "He saw it, of course, but didn't act on it. Instead he asked me to join his research lab. He taught me so much about methodology, about technique. He offered to supervise my senior thesis. We worked closely together for months before things got physical, but then one day over summer we were in the lab alone late at night working on a paper and just happened. Oh God, I thought it was the best day of my life. I imagined us getting married and having brilliant little physicist children," I almost laughed.

"But perhaps he didn't?"

"I don't know," I said. "Maybe he did. We said we'd keep it a secret from the rest of the lab, at least until I graduated, but of course, that wasn't easy to do. Everyone knew what was going on and it caused some resentment, especially among his grad students. They felt like I was getting special treatment because of our relationship. And frankly, I was. He wanted me to get into graduate school so he was putting me on papers that I probably shouldn't have been on, pouring all his energy into helping me with my thesis and not reading other students' papers as a result."

"So what happened?"

"He got controlling." I said matter-of-factly. "I was 21 and I wanted to be out at the bars with my friends and he wanted me in the lab. He started keeping close tabs on me, monitoring who I hung out with, what I drank, how many hours I booked at the library. He told me that it was the only way to get into a doctoral program. He'd written me letters."

"He was being too much like your father?"

"After 18 years on a military regimen I just couldn't take it from James, too. I know that he was trying to help, but it irked me. I felt like I was a teenager again, wearing the shortest skirts I owned and partying too late just to make him mad. We fought about it all the time until I told him that I didn't want a Ph.D. in Physics. I wanted to go to med school."

"Like your father wanted you to do," she filled in.

"James lost it. He completely flew off the handle. He told me that I'd wasted his time, his energy, that he'd poured himself into me because he wanted me to be successful and I was throwing it all away. He'd put his career on the line, his reputation," my voice was growing soft. "He almost convinced me to go because I felt so guilty. I wanted him to love me so badly. But when I got the invite letter from Georgetown for med school, I couldn't turn it down."

"So you ended it with him?"

"I guess it was mutual," I said. "He signed off on my thesis, he shook my hand at graduation, and we just went on with our lives."

"Do you regret it?"

"No," I said. "I did for a while. I remember calling my sister in tears for weeks, asking her if I'd made the right choice." I let out a small laugh. "She was so wise. She'd just tell me that everything was alright, that I'd done what was best for me, and the universe would send me what I needed. James wasn't it anymore."

"And you believed her?"

"I don't know. I think about the universe a little differently than she did. I don't believe in fate and she did wholeheartedly. But, it was comforting anyway, just to have her tell me that it was okay. Medical school just felt like where I belonged. I wanted to help people, and the work that I was doing in James's lab, it was just too theoretical."

"You made a good choice, Dana, and I'm sure you know that now."

"But I think I made it partly just to make him mad. I knew it was the thing I could do to cut James the deepest, turn my back on his field- the same way I turned my back on what my father wanted me to do."

"It's normal to see these parallels, Dana. You don't need to carry any guilt about it."

"That's not the whole story, Meg," I said, turning my eyes to the floor.

"Oh?" she beckoned me to continue.

"When I was starting my third year of medical school, on my very first clinical rotation, I met Daniel Waterson. All the other women in my rotations and I though he was the dreamiest thing in a lab coat, and he clearly knew it. I worshiped him the same way I'd worshiped James at first. I hung on every word." I said. "He took the whole group of us out at the end of the rotation in August to celebrate surviving our first one. Oh, they were all jealous when he sat next to me. He kept inching his leg closer to mine all evening, coming up with reasons to touch me. He put his hand on my thigh towards the end of the night and waited until no one was looking to whisper, 'I want you,' in my ear. I thought I was going to die." I felt my face flush red with the thought, thinking back on the way my whole body felt electrified by his touch.

"And you took him up on it?"

"I knew I shouldn't, Meg. But I was 25, I was exhausted, I was a little drunk. I let him take me back to his office and make love to me right there on the examining table."

"Was it fully consensual?" she asked, somewhat concerned.

"Yeah," I said guiltily, "I wanted it. I wanted him. I knew I shouldn't. He was married, he was supposed to be mentoring us; it was a terrible choice. But, God, it felt so right."

She hummed with interest and nodded.

"We started meeting in secret during the day at the hospital, wherever we could find a space that wouldn't be disturbed. Sometimes we'd meet up after work and have a drink then go back to his office or my apartment. I craved him. He was so powerful."

"Powerful?" she echoed.

"He saved lives for a living. He was brilliant at what he did. Everyone looked up to him, respected him," it felt absurd even saying it out loud. I kept my eyes on the floor and bit the inside of my lip.

"How long did it go on?"

I let out an embarrassed, nervous laugh. "Too long. He told me he'd help me get into the residency I wanted to go to. He had connections with the senior physicians. He wrote me glowing letters of rec and talked to them personally. We'd been together for almost two years when the FBI started trying to woo me. He thought it was a terrible idea. He wanted me to follow in his footsteps."

She bobbed her head in understanding.

"Noticing a pattern?" I scoffed.

"It's okay, Dana."

I disagreed, shaking my head. "It wasn't, Meg. He had a family, a wife, two daughters in high school. I was closer to their age than to his. Once he had me stop in to help one with her physics homework. I was his mistress. I'll never forgive myself for that."

"Did his wife know?"

"I didn't think so at the time. I thought we were hiding it so well. But looking back on it now, I don't know how she couldn't have known. They'd been together for 20 years. When you're with someone that long, how could you not know?" I glanced out the window behind her, feeling guilty even talking about it. "He said he'd leave her when the girls were out of the house. He didn't want to hurt them. I told him not to. I told him it's not what I wanted, but he insisted. His youngest was a junior when I graduated from med school. He said if I took a residency close by we'd be living together by the time I started my second year," I swallowed hard. "I was terrified."

"So you joined the FBI instead?"

"I couldn't be the person to break up his family, to ruin his marriage. I thought maybe if I took the offer from the FBI he'd be mad enough that we could end it, just stop and go back to the way things were."

"Did it work?"

I shook my head. "No. I wasn't 2 weeks into my training at Quantico that he was at my front door, begging for me to take him back. I guess part of me knew it would happen if I stayed in DC. I knew he'd forgive me for choosing a different path, just like my father did. And sure enough, there he was, promising that we'd be together for real in just a few months. His youngest was a senior by then. She'd be leaving in 3 months. He started looking for apartments for us. I was panicked. It's not what I wanted."

"So what did you do?"

"The only thing I could. I cut him out of my life. I told him it was over. I blocked his calls. I threw away his number. I moved to a new apartment. He tried to find me, anyway. One day he called the department at Quantico while I was in class and told them he was my doctor and he had to speak with me right away. I was livid. I called his bluff. I told him if he ever contacted again I'd tell his wife everything. He must have known I'd do it, because that was the last I heard from him."

"Ever?"

"Essentially. I still see his work in the medical journals from time to time. They interviewed him on NPR not too long go to talk about a clinical trail, but that's about it."

"Do you miss him?"

"Sometimes. I loved him a lot. It was the longest relationship I've ever been in."

I saw her gaze flicker when I said it, and I regretted disclosing so much. "You haven't had a long term relationship since then?"

"I have," I said cautiously. "But I was with Daniel for almost three years. As guilty as I feel about how it happened, he was an important part of my life. He taught me more than just about anyone I've ever known."

"Dana, you can't carry around this guilt forever. You were young, and he was in a position of authority. Yes, you could have done things differently, but he should have been the responsible party here. He shouldn't have put you in that situation."

"I was old enough to know better, Meg. I am as responsible as he was."

"But you were the one mature enough to end things," she reminded.

"But not until he forced me to, not until he became so overbearing that I had to do something to get out."

She was quiet for a moment. "Did you learn something from this experience, Dana?"

I shifted my eyes up and unintentionally caught her gaze. She looked into me, as if pulling out my truth. I felt my forehead tighten and my brow move. "You'd think I would have."

She pursed her lips and changed her gaze. I couldn't tell if it was compassion or pity. "It happens at Quantico, Dana. It happens to more young women in that program than you'd guess." It was like she knew my story before I could tell it.

"But I wasn't just any young woman, Meg. I was a girl who slept with her professor in college, and the former mistress of a well-respected physician. It wasn't Quantico, it was me."

"Was he married?" she asked cautiously.

"No," I said. "His name was Jack, he wasn't even in my division. I met him in the cafeteria when I was studying alone. He came and sat down next to me and introduced himself. He'd seen me there before. It was like I was being picked up at a bar."

"So he wasn't your instructor?"

"Not specifically, no. I'd been to his lectures, seen him talk, I knew he was bright, talented, and he'd heard the same about me. We had a lot in common, and really had fun together. He taught me how to ski. We dated for almost a year."

"And then?"

I felt emotions rising within me. How did she do it every time? How did she put me in these situations? I let out half a laugh to try to hide how close I could tell I was to tears. "He didn't want to have family. I was almost 30 and I felt like I needed to find someone ready to settle down. He insisted that having kids was only going to jeopardize my career. He kept telling me that successful female agents don't have kids. He said if I started a family I'd be on the fast track to nothing. He'd seen it before."

"And you believed him?"

"There's certainly some truth to it. I know that. He said that he could put my name in and get me placed in violent crimes if I wanted it. He could help me play in the boys club. It was enticing. But it felt like the harder he pushed it the more I wanted to push back. I really did want a family, and I didn't want to waste any more time with someone who didn't."

"So you broke up?"

"It was amiable. We stayed friends. I think we just realized that we couldn't be romantically involved. We wanted different things."

"Did you end your physical relationship?" she asked. I felt a little taken aback by the question, as if she was suggesting something much larger than she was letting on.

"Yes." I said honestly. "We decided it was for the best for both of us."

She nodded. "Do you still think that?"

"Are you suggesting that I shouldn't?" I asked somewhat defensively.

"No, Dana," she said, softening her tone to ease my defensive posture. "But given what we talked about last week, what you've said to me about your ideas on children now, I could understand how you might feel differently. Have you thought about contacting him now?"

"Jack Willis is dead," I said, keeping my tone professional to avoid feeling it. "He was killed in the line of duty in 1995."

"I'm sorry, Dana."

"I was there," I continued. "We were taken hostage and Jack," I swallowed hard, emotions trying to take over again, "Jack was diabetic and they wouldn't give him the insulin he needed. I watched him die."

"Oh Dana," she sighed.

I hated the pity I her tone. So I sat up, straightening myself. "It's fine, Meg. I've had time to process it."

She cocked her head and looked at me softly. "Do you think that things would be different, or could have been different, if it hadn't happened, given what you know now?"

I pursed my lips. "It doesn't matter what I think, Meg. He's dead."

"How you feel matters," she suggested.

"People die," I said. "I've come to see that. It's a part of my life."

"It's not your fault, Dana. You know that. When an agent is killed in the line of duty you can never take the blame."

"I know. It's not my fault. But, it's one more person who I loved who died beside me." More evidence, I thought, that everything I love will be taken from me. I knew I couldn't say that.

"You have a difficult job," she said softly, "and that's why people like me are here to help, to remind you when it feels like everyone around you is in harms way, that you can't dwell on that. All that you can do is love the ones you have, and savor every moment that you get with them."

I sucked in a sharp breath through my nose, keeping my lips clenched tightly together.

"I'd love to continue our discussion, Dana, but I'm aware of the time." Her eyes shifted to the clock on the wall. We'd gone nearly ten minutes over.

"I'm so sorry," I said, jumping to my feet.

"It's okay, Dana. Sometimes we need it. Today, you needed it."

My thoughts swam, but landed somewhere I knew they would. There was only one thing I needed right now, something I knew I had no right to ask for today. I knew Mulder would tease me when I got back to the office. He'd ask me about my trip to the shrink. He'd make a joke about Freud and waggle his eyebrows suggestively. But he wouldn't know the journey I'd been on, he wouldn't know why I needed him.

"So we'll see you in two weeks?" Meg pulled me from my thoughts.

"Yeah," I said, "two weeks."


	5. Chapter 5

**Session 5**

 **March 9, 1999**

 **J. Edgar Hoover Building**

(Set after Arcadia 6.15)

* * *

"Dana," Meg said with smile, "how are you doing today?"

I took my seat and settled in. "Fine," I said, nodding. "Things are good."

"That's great to hear, Dana," she said. "Can you tell me about why?"

"Nothing in particular," I said. For some reason, I'd been feeling lighthearted ever since our most recent trip to California.

"Work is going well? You're still enjoying being back on the X-files?"

"Yeah," I nodded. "We just closed a case in San Diego."

"Oh, did you get to see your brother? He lives there, doesn't he?"

"I did, yeah, I stopped in to see he and Tara and the baby one afternoon while waiting for lab work."

"I bet that was nice treat."

"It was," I said, glad that she was able to write off my good mood onto the trip to see my brother. The last thing I wanted her to think was that I just wanted to play house.

"And the case?" she probed, as if reading my thoughts.

"It was interesting, our first undercover assignment."

"Undercover? What were your roles?"

I tried to smother a grin, "We were investigating murders at a planned community. We were undercover as a new residents."

"As a couple?" she offered.

"Yes," I nodded curtly, hoping that she couldn't read my playful expression.

Clearly, she had. "And you enjoyed it?"

"It can be fun to play a role," I said, "however farfetched."

She gave me a small smile and took her opening. "Dana, we talked a lot last session about your past relationships. I know that was a lot to divulge. How are you feeling about that?"

"Okay, I guess. It's not like any of that is a secret. I've known for years that I have this," I searched for the right word, "tendency." My mind spun back to an evening in a smoky bar with a stranger. My head was swirling from too many cocktails as I poured my story out onto the table like a cheap drink. Meg was certainly not the first to know about my affinity for powerful men, and the snake tattoo on my back could prove it.

"Do you mind if I ask you another question then," she began, "about what we talked about last week?"

"You may," I said, unsure that this was a wise permission to grant.

"Do you think any of this power differential comes into play with your relationship with Agent Mulder?"

I pressed my lips together, thinking about how tenderly Mulder traced his finger over my tattoo when he first saw it. He didn't ask what it meant. He didn't ask why. We don't have that kind of relationship. But, part of me could swear that he knew. "I've considered that," I nodded. "And yes, I think at a time in our relationship it did. I've worked hard, though, to set boundaries, to be sure that we're equals. Plus, my relationship with him is very different than my relationship with those other men."

"In that it's not a romantic relationship," she filled in.

"Yes, that's certainly part of it. But also in how long it's lasted. I was forced to deal with some of those feelings a number of years ago. I think our relationship is stronger for it." I carefully omitted the words about how I'd dealt with them.

"So you think you've learned how to deal with those feelings with Mulder," she mirrored. "Do you think that this is a pattern you'd be able to break in a future romantic relationship?"

"I don't foresee that ever being an issue, Meg."

"Why not?"

"Like I told you in our first session, I don't foresee ever being in another romantic relationship."

She furrowed her brow. "That's not quite how I recall it, Dana. I remember you telling me that your work is dangerous, that you don't have time to date right now. I don't think that you mentioned that you'd given up on the hope of _ever_ finding a partner."

I felt myself blush, feeling as though I'd been caught in my own trap, but tried to compose myself. "Perhaps I understated. But, no, from where I stand now, I don't think another romantic relationship is in the cards."

"What if your work were to change? If you were to be transferred back to Quantico? Or, eventually, when you retire?"

Of course I'd considered these options. What if? What if things were different? If the X-files closed for good? But there was only one man that I could imagine by my side in any of those scenarios. Come retirement, colonization, or huge piles of manure, there was no one else I'd want. I stared out the window and saw a bird hopping by on a branch with a little twig in her mouth. She fluttered a bit, back and forth, as if checking for safety.

"Is it because of Agent Mulder?" Meg's voice pulled me back to the moment. I'd been silent too long. I turned my eyes to meet hers and let out a defeated sigh. She kept the same pleasantly neutral expression as I let my eyes drift back to the window. The little bird had flown off to build her nest, it was that time of year. "You've already got a partner in him?" I heard Meg suggest as I searched the window scene for something else to watch. "Dana?"

I redirected my attention. "My relationship with Mulder isn't a romantic one," I clarified. "But yes, like I've said, he's a really important figure in my life. For me, he fills the space that perhaps, for many women, a romantic partner would fill." I chose my words with precision, trying to give her no room for interpretation.

She nodded and poised her lips. I could detect a small amount of uneasiness in her expression, something she didn't often show. It made me uncomfortable so I redirected my eyes to the carpet, scanning the floor and walls to avoid her eyes. "Dana, you of course can choose not answer if you'd prefer not to, but," she paused and waited for me to look back at her, to focus on the conversation, "do you have a physical relationship with Agent Mulder?"

My jaw tensed in a way that was usually reserved for the most upsetting of affronts. I glared at her with the steeliest gaze I could muster, and I sat in silence for a moment, trying to will her to back down. But, she couldn't be defeated. Psychologists, it seemed, were trained for this type of warfare.

"I prefer not to answer that question," I stated with a cold matter-of-factness.

"Okay," she said lightly, as if my glare and tone had rolled completely off of her without notice. "Well, if you decide that is something you'd like to talk about, do remember that this is a relationship of confidence. I'll never report anything from our sessions to anyone outside unless I'm seriously worried about your immediate physical safety."

While she seemed to have moved on, my body refused to. Every muscle was tense, my nails dug into my palms from making tight fists. My stomach was tied in a knot.

"So," she flitted on to a new topic, "has your nephew grown a lot since Christmas?"

My jaw still tense, I began to investigate each ridge of my teeth with my tongue. My hands had unclenched from fists and I found myself wringing them, my right hand anxiously working the mound of my left.

"I really upset you with that question, Dana," she said, finally returning to the topic after I'd stared out the window long enough, ignoring her attempts to move on. "I'm sorry. I didn't realize that it would be as upsetting as it seems to be. I really apologize for making you uncomfortable."

The same little bird hopped back past the window, this time with nothing in her mouth. She was searching for something new. I didn't take my eyes off of her as the words started to pour from my mouth. "The first time we kissed it wasn't magic or fireworks. It just seemed like the only way to tell him what I wanted to say."

"And what was that?" Meg asked, revealing no surprise in my admission.

"I missed you. I'm glad you're back. I don't know what I would have done if you'd actually been gone for good." I said thoughtfully, my eyes still focused out the window. "He'd been missing in the New Mexico desert. He'd missed his own father's funeral. I thought I was going to have to be the one to tell his mother that he was dead."

I thought back to that moment in the elevator. _"I just knew,"_ hung in the air and Mulder gave me this smile, it was so pure, so trusting, so loving. When the doors closed I stepped in front of him, I put my hands on his forearms, I tilted my head every so slightly to the right, and I leaned in. There is no way I would have had the guts to do it all on my own, but I found that he naturally filled the space between us and met my lips. It was a soft, chaste kiss. A quick, tender, meeting of slightly parted lips. Just the thought made me feel little woozy, even now. But, as quickly as it started it was past, the interaction from start to finish taking less than 10 seconds. Then, I was back at his side, standing formally beside him, ready to be a professional again.

Meg nodded silently, coaxing me to continue.

"And after that I guess it just became a phrase to us. There were moments when it was just the only thing that made sense to say."

She let my words hover in the silence. "But you don't think of this as a romantic relationship." It wasn't a question, it was a statement, albeit a skeptical one.

I shook my head. "It wasn't romantic, Meg. It wasn't even sexual. It didn't change anything between us. I never felt any different about him as a result. When everything else had failed a kiss became the Hail Mary pass of communication. The same way that you might give a friend a hug to show support, it was just another phrase that said more than words could."

"And is it a frequent phrase?" she asked. It pulled me from my thoughts and causing me to break contact with the little bird I'd gone back to watching.

I felt my professional demeanor return. "Not particularly." She nodded, but didn't say a word, turning my own strategy of silence back on me. "It really was reserved just for the most dire of moments, days when one of us was just so crumpled, so beaten down, that we didn't have any words left to say. It happened maybe five or six times. It was never a casual thing, never a part of the day-to-day, but I think even in the worst times we knew it was there, an option." I though about the squabbles and the fights, the times we disagreed. No matter how mad I was at him, I still couldn't shake how I felt when he kissed me.

"But then I got sick," I swallowed a lump forming in my throat. "The cancer was killing me and we both thought this was the end, and the kisses stopped. I pulled away from him, allowing him to kiss my head, my forehead, my cheek, but a real kiss," I shook my head lightly. "I guess its when I realized the kisses didn't mean as little as I'd though they had." I let a sound slip from that was somewhere between a sniffle and a laugh. "I wanted to believe that they didn't mean anything. But when I thought about what it would mean to him when I was dead- I guess I thought I was protecting him."

She made an encouraging little, "Hmm," in an effort to keep me talking, but I stopped and looked out the window again. I realized that I'd ended at just the right moment. I could stop here. I could still get myself off the hook if I wanted to. For all she knew, that was the end of the story. I turned back to look at her with a pleasant expression, hoping for a change in conversation.

"And after the cancer went into remission?" she asked.

My stomach knotted again. She wasn't going to be fooled, after all.

I closed my eyes and took a breath. "He was at the hospital with me when I got the news. He'd come to talk to me about what was going on with work, my mom and brother had stepped out to get something to eat, and the doctor came in to update me on the most recent tests. They seemed to good to be true, he'd said, but the most recent labs suggested that something had happened, quickly, enigmatically, and that it appeared to have just gone quiet. I tried to be skeptical with the doctor; we would need to wait and see. But when he left Mulder leaned in and kissed me, and I didn't turn away. I guess he was trying to say the same thing I'd been trying to say all those years before when I kissed him the first time."

She smiled softly at me as I spoke. "That's beautiful, Dana. Thank you for sharing that with me." We sat in the silence for a moment together, both wondering what the other was thinking. I debated if I should continue. Again, I could have stopped, I could have taken this chance to end the conversation. Finally, she broke the silence, "So, do you mind if I ask about the direction your relationship with Agent Mulder took after that?"

I was terrified about what I was about to let myself say, but I continued. "I remember thinking that day in the hospital that things were going to go back to being exactly like they were before, but I was wrong. It was like the kisses just stopped being strong enough, after that. They lost their potency, somehow. My mom and brother had left. They discharged me from the hospital. I was just so happy to be alive." I felt myself growing increasingly nervous as I spoke. "Mulder drove me home and we talked about how good it would be to get back to work. We danced around this thing that we both wanted to say but couldn't. So, I thought, maybe a kiss would say it. It had always worked in the past. But, all the kisses in the world weren't enough. I tried." I steeled myself for the words I was about to speak aloud, words I had never before let myself speak aloud. "We slept together," I felt my face warm with a blush and held my hand protectively at my brow.

"It's okay to admit that Dana. Sex between two consenting adults is nothing to be embarrassed about. Physical intimacy can be a comfort."

"It wasn't just comfort, Meg. It was more that that. It was something I'd never experienced before. It was like we connected in a way we'd never done before. Like he was telling me how important I was to him, and I was tell him the same. It was so intimate," it felt strange to talk about something so private with this woman, but I had to justify my behavior. I had to convince her I wasn't stereotype. I wasn't some bimbo receptionist banging the first suit that came around. I wasn't my college self, sleeping with a professor just because he was powerful. This was different.

"Did you ever tell Agent Mulder that?"

I tried to bring back my stoic self, embarrassed for letting this more personal and far less professional version of myself be exposed. I tried to maintain my composure. I shook my head. "I didn't have to. He knew. We both knew."

She waited in silence, lips pursed, then finally spoke. "Did it change your relationship?"

"Less than you might expect," I said regaining the analytical tone I found so comforting. "In some ways its sort of hard to tell how much of the change was because of the sex and how much was just because I was alive again. My relationships with everyone changed. I let myself be more open, to love, to connection. I certainly think we're better friends than we were before it happened, but there are too many other confounding variables. We laugh more, we trust each other more, we're closer than ever."

"Better friends," she repeated, "that's a fortunate outcome." She paused and looked at me, bringing her hand to her chin inquisitively. "But you don't consider your relationship to be a romantic one?" This time it was a question.

"I know it sounds odd, Meg. I wouldn't have understood it myself, once. But, no, I don't, we don't. We're still just the same us, colleagues, friends, allies. You and I talked about it weeks ago, the difference between intimacy and romance. You agreed with me that too many people can't separate them," I felt an urgency in my voice as I tried to convince her. "Even pretending to be that way on this last case, it made my skin crawl."

She smirked at that. "What was so uncomfortable about it?"

"I used to think that life was exactly the life I wanted: manicured lawns, and pet names, niceties with neighbors, and a husband who would pretend to enjoy it with me. Even Mulder pointed out that I fit in well with them. But it just felt like such a show. It was so insincere. Romance is…" I searched for the words, "compared to what I have with Mulder romance is trite."

"Thats interesting, Dana, and it certainly speaks to how important your relationship is. Do you mind if I ask, has this sexual relationship been ongoing? "

I averted my gaze, feeling oddly uncomfortable discussing this, mostly because I hadn't even really grappled with it myself. "Again, it's not at all frequent." I wasn't about to give her the play by play, although I knew without much effort I could have. After my cancer, after Emily's funeral, after Cassandra was taken, when we got back from Antarctica. Each time was special, memorable. "It's hard to explain without sounding…" I didn't even know what word to use. "It's not even about the sex," I said. "I mean, it is, but it isn't." I wasn't helping my own case. "It's only when there is no other way to say what needs to be said. We both seem to know when it's okay and when it isn't."

I though about all the times that it _hadn't_ happened, which spoke volumes that I couldn't. I thought back to that night, after the X-files had been shut down that I heard him pound on my door and I jumped from my bed to greet him, thinking for sure that he was here to make the pain stop, to make me orgasm until we both fell into a sleep that we couldn't find alone. But instead I smelled alcohol on his breath and I knew that hope was futile. We wouldn't have sex when one of us was drunk.

We hadn't had sex after that strangely romantic night in Indiana when we danced to Cher, a night that would have sealed the fate of this new type of relationship into regular one. We hadn't had sex in the woods with an invisible monster watching, when the body heat we could have created, alone, might have benefited us both. We hadn't had sex last month after the high school reunion, after I all but admitted my feelings for Mulder to a stranger in a high school bathroom. We hadn't even had sex on Christmas, when we'd been mistaken for lovers and faced our own mortality together. I'd wanted to, probably even more than I was willing to admit. But, every time I'd settled for a kiss on the forehead. "It's never romantic, we don't break fraternization protocol on cases, and it's never," I paused again, "it's never seductive. There are no candles or wine or bearskin rugs. It's about communication."

"Communication?" she repeated. I could hear the doubt in her voice.

"It's like a way of saying I'm glad that you're alive, and I'm glad that I'm alive, and no matter what differences we might have professionally, or even personally at times, we both remember that. I guess really it's the same thing we've been trying to say to each other all along."

She hummed and pondered my words with interest. "Can I ask who typically initiates the contact?" she asked.

I thought back to those moments and tried to replay them each in my mind. It filled me with warmth just to look back on them. I'd been most forceful with him that first time. I'd been the one to unbutton his slacks, to pull him on top of me when he was so scared he'd hurt me. He was always scared he'd hurt me. "I suppose I do," I admitted, only realizing it for the first time myself, "but I think the communication is mutual."

She nodded and let a long silence rest between us. "Is it possible," she began tentatively, "and I'm just throwing this out there to see if it resonates," she continued carefully, "are you trying to communicate love?"

My mouth fell agape. I wanted to defend myself, and Mulder. I wanted to insist that, no, it wasn't that way at all. But, then, there was no doubt that we loved each other. Hell, we'd both said it more than once. I wanted to argue that it was _more_ than that. It wasn't just love, it was… but I had no idea what else I could say. What trumps love? The silence was building between us so, giving up on planning out my thoughts before speaking, I opened my mouth to try to defend us. Instead, I just sputtered and stuttered for words. I was hit by a wave of emotion. Frustrated that I couldn't explain myself, enraged that she would accuse me of this pedestrian experience, but simultaneously so unable to deny it. The tension started in my stomach and traveled to my chest and then my throat. My eyes brimmed with tears and whatever it was inside of me refused to stay in. I gulped for air and I felt my face contort.

I jumped from my seat and darted to the window. Now I was behind her, facing away, watching the world pass by through tear-blurred eyes, big tears rolling down my face and silenced wails pouring from my mouth. I smashed my face into my hands to hide what I'm sure was a hideous sight.

She gave me a few moments to myself before I could feel her presence behind me, her hand on my back gently rubbing circles. "It's okay, Dana," she said softly. "It's okay."

I didn't have the composure to speak. I just continued to sob.

"Loving is the scariest thing we'll ever do."

I gathered myself long enough to speak a single line. "I think I'd like to go now," I said, with as much dignity as I could muster through my tears.

"Of course, Dana," Meg said softly. She paused before adding, "Will I see you in two weeks?"

I wanted to ask if I had to come, like a petulant child. I wanted out of this. I never wanted to come back. But, I knew it wasn't a choice. Just one more session. "Yes," I gulped for air, "I'll see you then."


	6. Chapter 6

**Session 6**

 **April 19, 1999**

 **J. Edgar Hoover Building**

(Set after Milagro 6.18)

* * *

"Dana," she said warmly as I entered the room, "I'm glad to see you."

I didn't respond as I took my seat in the same large, overstuffed chair I'd come to think of as my own place in this room.

"How have you been?"

"Fine," I responded curtly.

"I worried when you cancelled our last session. I'm glad that we were able to reschedule."

"I was in Mississippi on a case," I explained. It was true. Granted, I hadn't been quick to reschedule. I'd pushed it off and pushed it off. But I'd done it, mostly out of duty.

She folded her hands in her lap meaningfully. "I know we had a challenging discussion last session, Dana. I appreciate your coming back."

I let the silence settle between us before breaking it. "I want to apologize, Meg, for overreacting," I said clinically.

"You don't need to apologize to me, " she said. "You had an emotional experience, and that's completely acceptable. Often, the therapeutic process brings up hard emotions."

"I should have maintained my composure," I said, now doing just that. I didn't want to give her the satisfaction of seeing me emotional again. I couldn't.

"Not at all, Dana," she replied. "I was glad that you felt like you could have the response you needed to."

I stared silently at her, stern faced.

"Have you had any time to think about what we discussed last session?" she finally asked.

"Yes," I said, raising one eyebrow almost unconsciously, "and I've decided that you were right." I was able to say it without emotion. I'd planned these words over the course of the past week. Of course, I'd grappled with them, fought with them. I'd let myself jealously lunge at Karin Berquist as she attempted to seduce my partner, still insisting that I wasn't in love with him myself. But as I'd lain there weeks later, bloody on the floor of his apartment, letting him hold me while I cried, I could no longer deny it. Padgett was right. I was already in love. "I think love describes what Agent Mulder and I are trying to communicate to one another very well. It was difficult for me to admit, but you were right."

It was her turn to raise an eyebrow. She seemed to be asking me if this was a trick of somesort, like she hadn't really expected me to admit it, but didn't want me to know that. "And have you talked with him about that?" she asked.

"I'm not certain it's a conversation that we're ready to have," I said calmly. It was without a doubt a cop out. I knew, and I'm sure she did too. That was simply code for, "I'm too scared to do it." I felt my stomach lurch. The words had seemed so steadfast in my head, but now that they hung between us they felt trite. Of course she knew what they meant.

She nodded. "Dana," she began carefully, "in our second session together we set a therapeutic goal together, do you remember that?"

"Yes," I said, worried about where this would head, but trying not to show it.

"Well today is likely our last session together, unless you'd like to continue, so I was hoping that we could check in on that goal, and think about how we're doing."

"Fine," I said, trying to maintain a professional tone.

"The goal we set was to continue the process of post-traumatic growth that began with your recovery from cancer. We agreed to look at ways to build more love and more connection into your life. Now you've told me about a lot of connections with people in the past, connections that might make it hard to love again. But I think you want to, Dana. Is that accurate?"

It made me sound so broken. "I can love, Meg. Yes, I keep people at a distance but I'm not…" I didn't have the words of my own so I was forced to rely on an archetype, "I'm not an ice queen." I thought of the way Padgett had described me to myself as we stood side by side at the church. He knew that I didn't let people in. He knew me. I felt a shudder run through me.

She smiled softly. "I know that Dana, and I certainly didn't say that you were. But I wonder if there is still progress to be made in learning to let people love you, and to love them back in kind?"

I cast my gaze to the floor, studying the carpeting that had become so familiar in these moments.

"Do you think that you could let Agent Mulder do that?"

"We're already so close…" I defended, but trailed off when I realized I had nothing else to say. My case was weak. She wouldn't accept it. I wouldn't accept it.

"Dana, I saw the way you reacted when I merely mentioned love," she reminded me.

I didn't know how to defend myself. "But I just admitted it to you. I love him, you're right, you win." I felt myself flush.

She smiled again, "I'm not here to win. And while I appreciate that you had the courage to say that out loud to me, I don't think I'm the person you need to say it to."

I sat wordlessly with my mouth slightly agape. I didn't know what to say.

"What are you so afraid of Dana? Are you afraid he wouldn't be able to say it back?"

I shook my head, still silent. He'd said those words to me just a few months before. After I'd found him floating in the Atlantic Ocean searching for a ghost ship, those had been his words upon return, "I love you, Scully." I'd brushed them off, ignored them. I'd treated them as if they didn't matter. But how many ways had he said I love you before that? I kept him honest, made him a whole person. I was his one in 5 million.

"Then what?" she probed.

I took a breath, and began, "I guess I'm afraid it would change things."

"How do you think things would change?"

"Our relationship is complex, Meg, and for right now, it's working. It's working perhaps better than ever. Why would I put that in jeopardy?"

"What is the risk?" she asked, not allowing me to dodge the question.

"I don't know," I finally admitted, my voice coming out more harshly than I'd expected, "but I'm not sure I'm ready to find out."

She paused and waited for me to relax my shoulders before continuing. "Are you afraid of ending up in an insincere romance, like the people in Arcadia? Well manicured lawns and pet names?"

"No, Mulder and I could never end up that way," I said. "Our work is too consuming and too much a part of who we are." I paused and thought for a moment about the promise of normality we'd both forgone. I thought back to trying to convince him that night outside Area 51 that at some point we deserved to stop, to be people. "I guess I'm afraid that if we admit that we're in love, if we were to cross that final boundary, it would just be too much. His passion will swallow me up whole, and there won't be anything left of me. Even as it is, sometimes he's more than I can handle. I need to keep a little bit of space, just to be sure that I don't drown in him."

She pursed her lips, "What would that look like, to you?"

I searched her eyes, as if she might have the answer for me. I felt my forehead wrinkle. "His passion for what he does, his quest, it has become our lives. Sometimes I have to pull myself out of it, to remind myself that we are two distinct human beings. We get so enmeshed in this thing that we share that sometimes we can just let it run away with us. Sometimes I just need to step back and be alone, to take the day or the evening, or at least the lunch hour to be Dana. I was a person before him. I was a woman with a life and a family and dream. I thought by now I'd be living in a house in the suburbs with my 2.5 children," the words felt like they were pouring from me. I couldn't stop them. "We spent Christmas Eve hunting ghosts for Christ sake! I know I only did it because I love him. If I admitted that to him, how would I ever be able to get out?"

She nodded knowingly and paused to allow me to compose myself a bit. "So you need a boundary. You need to know the difference between the personal and the professional, and by letting him into your personal life, you're afraid that boundary would disappear all together?"

"It's not just that," I said, trying to put together the words. "It's that the professional has become the personal. The professional has consumed the personal. I had myself convinced that the sex was professional, and that terrifies me Meg," I blurted out. I hadn't meant to admit that to her.

It had dawned on me while I read Padgett's manuscript. I'd let myself imagine his touch. I'd let him get inside my head. It made me feel terrible, guilty, like I was somehow unfaithful to Mulder for even imagining that type of intimacy with another man. But why? If all that Mulder and I had was professional, why was I not allowed to imagine the caress of another? If he was allowed to pick up women with no social skills on the internet, why did this make me a cheater? It came to me that perhaps what we had wasn't professional anymore at all.

She was silent for a moment, either processing it, or letting me process it, I'm not sure which. "Relationships that span multiple domains of our lives can be difficult in that way," she said. Although I was pretty certain it wasn't intended to be chastising, it felt a little bit that way. She must have read my face because she quickly followed up. "I'm not saying that to be critical, Dana. I say it because I'm here to help with challenges. My job is to help you come up with strategies to cope with these types of things." She paused. "Do you realize that that was just about the first negative thing you've said about your partner to me? Do you know how rare that is?"

I smiled, unaware that I hadn't complained more about him and his habit of ditching me, his habit of shutting me out, his habit of getting us both into tight spots, and of believing blindly whatever wild idea he heard. "I find that hard to believe."

"I've been taking notice, Dana. Your relationship with Agent Mulder doesn't worry me. If fact, you seem to have a strong working relationship. You seem to enjoy one another's company. Does it worry you?"

"No, I think if anything I've made the case that I am happy with the relationship. I don't think that we're ready for it to change," I insisted.

"There's nothing that you'd see changed?"

"Nothing I'd be willing to risk what we have for, no."

She pursed her lips inquisitively. "It's interesting, Dana, the way you keep talking about risk. It's almost as if you see this relationship as very fragile, like any wrong move could break it. Do you feel that way?"

I felt upset again; she was pushing buttons I wished she wouldn't. "I guess, so, yes."

"Why do you think that you feel that? Do you have any evidence of that?"

Of course I didn't. Our relationship had withstood more tests in 6 years that most marriages withstand in a lifetime. After all we'd been through together, nothing could break it. I think we both knew that. I shook my head.

"Are you scared that he would abandon you?" she asked carefully.

"No," I shook my head again and my voice fell quiet. "I'm scared that I might abandon him." The words felt terrible tumbling softly from my mouth. I wished they weren't true.

"Why?"

"I am a flight risk, I always have been, and somehow Mulder and I have made it this far. But I worry, I catch myself thinking of running away, of giving up on him. And I hate myself for it, but sometimes he just makes me so…" I heard my voice get tense and paused. "His passion terrifies me at times. He does things sometimes that infuriate me. He gets me to do things that infuriate me. They make me want to leave and never come back. But so far, I've managed to stay. I don't want to ruin that."

She nodded understandingly, then shifted her posture. "There's a strategy I sometimes use to help people think about what they really want out of a situation, Dana, that I think might be a good one to try here. Rather than talking about the things that you don't want to happen this relationships, what if we make two lists: one of things that you like about your relationship with Agent Mulder, and one of things that would improve the relationship, things that you'd like to see happen. We'll set risk and change aside for a second and just talk about positives. Can we do that?" She didn't wait for permission before turning the page on her legal pad and drawing a link down the middle of the page. Then she looked up at me for my consent.

I wasn't certain that I wanted to, but I tried to trust her. "Alright."

"Terrific," she poised her pen, "So let's start with the easy part, what are some strengths in your relationship?"

I paused to sort my thoughts, "Well, as you said, we work well together. We enjoy spending time together. We can read each other pretty well." I stopped to think and let her pen catch up with me. "There's trust, and cooperation, and compassion," for as uncomfortable as I felt with this task, it was easier than I'd expected. She nodded along merrily, taking notes on what I'd said in a column down one side of the page. "We're always there for one another, willing to put our lives on the line for one another, we go to bat for one another. You know, there are times when one or the other of us has to say something unpopular, and we have each others back in those situations."

She hummed as she finished jotting down my last thought. "Great, those seemed to come to you easily."

I nodded, still thinking of the positives in my relationship with my partner, censoring out the things I couldn't very well tell her, things about his touch, and the way that I felt safe with him, about how it felt like his arms alone could drive away my demons. I opened my mouth to continue, "I like that he challenges me to think about the world in ways I never had before. He thinks about things so differently that it makes me have to question everything, every day. He teaches me things and he listens when I try to do the same," I mused for a moment, thinking about that day in the hallway, when he told me that I keep him honest. In so many ways he did the same for me. "We laugh together," I said with a smile dancing across my lips. I thought about that first case in Oregon, about laughing in the rain, about how many times a day he lobbed a one-liner that made me have to smother a chuckle to maintain my professional demeanor, about how many nights I'd get home and just replay them to myself and laugh, the more recent occasions of calling him up to share that laugh with him, recount the day even though it had just ended.

"And how about the other list?" she asked, interrupting my reverie. I wanted to keep going. This felt good. "How you would describe things that would benefit the relationship, or make you enjoy it even more? Not problems, but things that you wish you had?"

My mind wandered for a moment, still grappling with all of the things I loved most about my partner and our relationship, about the moments we shared. I thought about my last session with Meg, when we finished and I walked back down to the basement wanting his touch so badly—wanting to wrap myself in his embrace— but knowing it was against the rules. Our rules. I thought about that evening, sitting on my couch alone with a glass of wine and wishing that he were there so I'd have someone to process with, but knowing that even if he were, he wouldn't be the one to talk about this stuff.

I stopped my wandering train of thought and began to sort my words, starting with the things I knew wouldn't hurt too much to say. I couldn't lead with those. I needed to be professional. "Mulder has a tendency for dangerous situations. He gets worked up about something and makes an impulsive decision to go do something that he knows he shouldn't. And rather than tell me, because he knows that I'll either try to stop him, or insist on going along myself, sometimes he doesn't tell me. I wish that would stop. I wish that'd he tell me rather than make me hunt him down in the middle of god knows where to save him."

"Okay," she scratched something down on her notepad in the second column. "And if he did tell you? You'd go? Is that what you want?"

I let the question roll around in my head. "No, I wish that he wouldn't go."

"So you wish he'd tell you, so that you could talk him out of it?"

"I wouldn't be able to if I tried," I said.

"So what could be improved?" she asked, her pen still waiting.

"I'm not sure."

She nodded. "Okay." It was almost as if she knew that had been trying to avoid the question. "Is there anything else that could be improved, perhaps about your relationship rather than Agent Mulder's behavior?"

I sighed, bracing myself for what I was about to say. "I guess there are times when it would be nice if we could open up to one another a little bit more. We try to keep things professional, to stick to stories about our work rather than our personal lives," I tried to formulate a concrete thought. "Frankly, you know more about me than he does in a lot of ways. We don't really talk about our pasts, our past relationships, our experiences outside of the work. It seems strange, sometimes, that we're so close but know so little about each other." The jealousy of Karin the dog lady reemerged. I wondered if he had opened up to her, and shared his stories. I wondered if he had crossed the professional boundary with her. He'd sensed my jealousy, clearly, when we met her. He tried to defend himself, but I wondered how many other women he'd allowed into his heart, how many other chickadees had trumped me in that domain.

My breath caught as I, for the first time realized that he may be as jealous of me as I was of him, that he may have delighted in the death of Padgett in the same way I'd secretly delighted in the death of Berquist.

"Hmm," she began making a quick note in the second column on her notebook, "that's interesting. I'd like to chat more about that, but let's continue with the list for now. What else could you improve?"

I racked my brain. For the first time I felt like my relationship with Mulder was thriving. We were moving in a good direction. We were collegial. We were enjoying one another. I couldn't think of anything else to say. "I really don't know." She let me sit in the silence, trying to come up with an answer. But try as I may to come up with something to improve my mind kept wandering back to the good. It felt absurd. I felt like a smitten school-girl, blinded by love.

Finally, she spoke. "I'm going to ask this tentatively, Dana, because I know it's sensitive," she began, "but since we're talking about ways to improve the relationship I thought I would put it on the table," she looked me square in the eye. "Are you satisfied with your physical relationship with Agent Mulder?"

I shouldn't have been surprised by the question, it crossed my mind just a moment before, but I felt my breath stop. I wondered how she knew, I wondered about her motives. I felt exposed. "I…" I began but didn't know how to continue, "I mean, I…" My face flushed red with embarrassment not by the question, but my inability to respond.

"I know it can be hard to talk about, Dana. But we're adults, we have physical desires. Its sounds like physical intimacy is intermittent as best, and that's not enough for some people." She said it so clinically, so matter-of-factly, I almost didn't know how to argue.

"Of course it would be nice if it were more frequent," I said, trying to match her demeanor, "but again, our sexual relationship is something that we engage in cautiously, and only when it's clearly appropriate."

"You already told me, Dana, that you use sex to express love. It's okay to express love at times when your life isn't on the line. It's okay to say 'I love you' just because. Isn't it?"

How many times had those thoughts run through my mind in the past two weeks? How many nights had I laid in bed thinking of him and wondering why it was that I couldn't have him? Because that was the agreement, I'd told myself. He is not my boyfriend, he is not my husband, he is not my lover. He is my partner. How many times had I explained that to others? I shouldn't need to explain it to myself. "He is my partner," I said, because they were the only words I had.

"What if you allowed him to be more than that?"

"Our relationship works the way that it is," I repeated, feeling the desperation slip into my voice.

"I realize that, Dana, but if you want communication, if you want intimacy, those things could be added without losing anything. Couldn't they? You don't have to lose yourself in him. You don't have to give up your sense of who you are like perhaps you have in the past. You're a strong woman. You can have the relationship that you want." She gave me a moment to ponder before following up. "I don't expect to change your mind on this over night, but I want you to consider it. Just because you've never done it before doesn't mean you never can."

"But what if I can't?" I finally asked, my voice threatening to crack.

"I know it's scary, Dana," she said softly. "But it doesn't have to be. What if you just kissed him, for no reason? Couldn't you? Couldn't you just kiss him and carry on with your day, write your field report, cook your dinner?"

She clearly didn't understand. "It's more complex than that."

"Why?" she almost argued.

I sat in the silence, letting the idea rattle around in my head. I tried to envision how he might respond if I suddenly began just kissing him nonchalantly, fucking him without an excuse. I couldn't imagine he'd stop me. But then, how would we know where to draw the line? How would we be able to go on acting like this wasn't a romance? "It's about boundaries."

"Set by whom?" she dug into me.

I truly scowled at her for the first time since our first session.

"Dana, you've built a wall to keep him out. That's a decision you're making."

"Our relationships is professional," I said firmly. "We aren't in a romantic relationship. We don't kiss for no reason, just like we don't share our personal lives."

"But, Dana, you just told me that you wish you would."

I sighed. My mind brought me back to that night on the couch with Eddie Van Bluhnt, having the type of conversation with my partner that we just never had, pouring my life story out to him in a most unprofessional way. I let the camera I my mind play up to the moment, just before Mulder knocked down the door, as Eddie leaned in to kiss me. A million things were running through that mind at that moment. We were breaking all the rules. This wasn't an, "I'm glad you're alive" kiss like we'd shared from time to time before. This was going to be a romantic kiss, a flushed with wine in front of a roaring fire kiss. I was playing out, as I felt him lean closer, how far I was going to let this go. Was I going to give him a soft kiss and then send him home, or was I going to let it happen, let him make love to me on the living room floor by the warm glow of my fireplace? Was I going to throw caution in to the wind and break the unspoken rules? I hadn't yet decided, when I heard Mulder slam through the doorframe, but I nearly had. It's perhaps what made that moment all the more scary. I'd been on the verge of living out my fantasy with the wrong man. "Sometimes," I admitted. I tried to keep my face stoic, but I could feel it deceiving me. "We don't cross that line for a reason, Meg," I tried to explain.

"And what is that reason?"

I had nothing to say, my mouth gaped open dumbly until I caught myself and latched it up. She let us sit in silence, perhaps hoping I would respond. I stared at the carpet again, uneasy. I'd already come this far, why not take it a step more. "I guess I worry about what might be said," I began, "if we let ourselves talk about more than work."

"What do you mean by that?" she probed.

"I worry that the truth might be more than we could take."

"You're afraid to learn about his past?"

"I don't know," I dodged the question. There was a worrying gnawing at me inside that I just couldn't bring myself to share.

"Is there something he could say, Dana, that would make you love him less?"

"No," I sighed. "It's just so much easier as it is."

"Dana I don't want to devalue what you're saying," she began carefully, "but I think this might be an irrational thought. You're catastrophizing."

"Am I?" I asked defensively.

"I want you to try it, Dana. I want you to break one of the rules."

"Meg, I…"

"I can't force you to do anything, Dana. I'm gong to sign off on your therapeutic mandate either way. You never have to see me again if you don't want to. But I want you to try. Things could be better and you know it. Why not make them better?"


	7. Epilogue

Author's Note: In all honesty, things devolve a bit from here and get a bit saccharine. If you can't get behind that, you can just stop now and say "the end."

* * *

 **Epilogue**

 **April 25, 1999**

(Set After The Unnatural 6.19)

* * *

"Hey mister," the kid shouted from the pitching mound. "It's nine o'clock, my ma says I got to be home."

"Well," Mulder said to me, unwrapping me from him, "I guess we're done." I waited at home plate while he pulled some cash out of his pocket and handed it to the boy. The kid ran off and Mulder wandered back to me. "Call it a night?" he asked.

Things could be better, Dana, told myself; although at that moment I had trouble believing it. For a moment things had been about as good as they'd ever been. Mulder's hands on my hips, his breath on my face, his hips pressed tight against mine and his raspy voice in my ear. Could things really be better? I braced myself for what I was about to do. "Unless you want to come back to my place and keep working on my form." I hoped that it would come across right, the kind of sexual banter that he so often initiated, the kind of jab that had become increasingly commonplace these last few months.

Mulder gave me a lopsided grin. "Are you coming on to me, Scully?"

"Well, you were the one who let me handle your bat all night," I teased.

He smiled and gathered up his bat and glove wandering back towards the parking lot. I followed close behind him until he reached his car. "See you Monday?" he asked as he opened his trunk.

"Oh come on, Mulder, after a birthday gift like that, the least I owe you is a beer. Stop by my place," I nudged, wondering if it was wise to push the issue.

"Oh, you were serious?" he looked some quizzically at me.

I grinned and let out half a chuckle. "Yeah, I was serious."

"Oh, well then yeah, I'll see you over there," he said, still a little taken aback.

"Great."

I arrived before him to the house and tidied up a bit, picking up the shoes I'd discarded by the door and putting a stray mug in the dishwasher. I felt butterflies in my stomach, the same butterflies I'd felt when he wrapped himself around me that evening, the same butterflies I'd felt when his hand pressed against my hip, guiding it into him. I was nervous, and admittedly aroused. I checked my face in the mirror when I heard his knock at the door, then opened it to usher him in.

"You beat me," he said.

"Not by much," I answered. "Take a seat, I'll grab us some beers."

I pulled two beers from the fridge, and I noticed that my hand shook a bit as I tried to uncap them. I hoped he hadn't heard the tinkle of the bottlecaps shuttering against the trembling opener in my hands. Taking a deep breath to calm my nerves I walked them over to the couch where Mulder sat. I took a seat next to him, just a bit closer than I usually would have.

"That was fun, Scully. Did you enjoy… how did you put it... hitting a piece of horse hide with a stick more than you thought you would?"

I smiled. "Yeah, I did." The words came out softer than I'd expected.

"Good. Maybe you were right. Maybe sometimes we should just go outside and play," he said.

"Especially if you get to rub up against my butt for an hour, right?" I teased.

He chuckled nervously, it made me feel a bit better to see that he was uneasy too. We were treading on unfamiliar ground here, pushing the limits of where we'd been. "What's gotten into you tonight?" he asked.

"Nothing," I said, and I braced myself for the next words I would speak. I didn't trust I could keep a straight face. "But I can think of something I wouldn't mind getting into me."

"You're going to have to tone down the innuendo Agent Scully, or I'm going to get the wrong idea," he took a sip of his beer and I could swear I saw the slightest blush roll across his cheeks.

"Maybe it's not the wrong idea," I said, taking his drink and setting it beside him. I leaned in to him, leaving him just a small chasm to cross to have his lips on mine.

He pressed a long slow kiss to my mouth. His hands made their way into my hair and I wrapped myself around him.

What followed wasn't the slow, careful sex we'd had in the past. There were no tears, no tender kisses of empathy. He didn't treat me like I was fragile. It was fun sex, something I hadn't done in so long I almost forgot it existed. He'd tickled my midsection and pulled me on top of him jauntily. I'd teased him slowly before riding him up to both of our breaking points, purring in his ear. I dismounted him with a satisfied smile and curled my naked body up beside his, panting with exquisite exhaustion.

"Well if I'd known batting practice got you so hot, Scully, I'd done that years ago," he tapped out playful messages on my bare skin with his fingertips.

"So this is okay," I asked tentatively. "You're okay with breaking," I searched for the word, "protocol?"

"Protocol?" he craned his neck to meet my gaze.

"You know this isn't how we usually go about this," I said carefully.

"What do you mean, Scully?" he asked, half teasingly. "We're only supposed to have sex when something terrible happens?"

"Mulder," I said, lacking the words to tell him that I was irked by his frankness.

"That was protocol?" he asked feigning naiveté. He smiled down at me. "I just thought you got off on that sort of thing."

I felt a strange sense of anger boiling up in me that I knew was irrational but couldn't quell. "Is that supposed to be a joke?" I asked unintentionally harshly, pulling myself away from him a bit.

"No, Scully," he said confused. "The only 'protocol' I knew about was that we had sex when you wanted to."

"When I wanted to!?" I screeched. I thought about the days and nights I'd spend longing for him, the lonely cold hotel beds thinking about how close he was, just on the other side of a thin wall. I thought about the afternoons in the office when I could smell his aftershave and had to talk myself down just to focus on my work, when I'd come home to find my panties damp because he'd given me a kiss on the cheek at the end of the day and my mind had run away with it. I thought about the hell I'd earned myself at Christmas dinner for spending a night with him longing for his touch. I lowered my tone. "You thought this was what I wanted? That I only wanted to have sex twice a year? This was just pity sex to you?" I asked, incredulously.

He looked sheepish. "Well, I sure wouldn't call it pity sex. It's not like I didn't want it. But everyone's appetite is different," he said lackadaisically, as if he'd thought a good deal about this. "I figured any sex with you was better than no sex. Is that not how you saw it?"

"Mulder!?" He was completely ignorant to what I was trying to say. "No, it's not. Why did you think that we were having sex?"

"Because we're in love," he said, almost nonchalantly.

My eyebrow shot up and I backed away from him even more to meet his eyes.

"Come on, Scully, I know we don't say it, but we both know it's true," he said. It was as if he was trying to convince me of some paranormal oddity. He took on the tone he so often used to persuade me of something that contradicted my science. This was professional Mulder at his finest.

I paused, suddenly feeling naked not just physically, but emotionally. I had to look away from him and close back up my mouth that had hung slightly agape. "So it's just that simple?" I said, my voice coming out rough and stern, the same tone I would use to counter him. I didn't know why, but I couldn't stop it.

He shrugged, but a wave of worry came over his face, "Isn't it?"

"Mulder, I've been in therapy for four months trying to figure out what the hell it meant," I admitted. "Four months to get me to the conclusion you just say like it's no big deal." I felt infuriated by my own ignorance. "Do you know how much I worried about this? I've spent weeks worrying about how I'd find the right moment?"

"The right moment for what?" he asked, the smirk reappearing on his face.

"For this, Mulder," I nearly shouted. He knew exactly what I'd meant, but wanted to make me say it. He was toying with me. "For a moment to ask you if you were okay with crossing the professional boundary and doing this without so many restraints."

His eyes twinkled. "Restraints? I didn't know that was an option, but whatever you like, G-woman."

"Mulder you know what I mean," I said sharply. I tried to understand how he could be so comfortable, so confident, ready for a joke, while I felt nothing but exposed and scared.

"No," he said, softer now, "I don't know what you mean. You thought that I would only be _willing_ to have sex with you when our worlds were crumbling down?"

"It's not just that, Mulder. I thought that it was," I paused as the absurdity of the word on my lips, "professional."

"Professional?" he balked.

"We're not lovers, Mulder, we're colleagues. I guess I thought that somehow the sex was tied to that. I thought that it was just an extension of the work relationship. I thought that was why it was limited to the moments it was."

He looked at me in tender disbelief. "It's not," he said. "I'm yours any time you want me, Scully, and not because I'm your partner, or because you nearly died. Because I love you."

I felt uncomfortable in the moment. I looked down at the couch between us to let his words sink in. Unsure of what else to do I curled myself back against him and set my head down on his chest. I could hear his hear his heart beating steadily beneath me and feel the rise and fall of his body with his breath. He wrapped an arm around and set it on my back tenderly. We stayed like that in the silence for a while, just listening to one another's breath in the quiet still of the evening. It had been such a joyful night. I'd laughed with him on that baseball field like I hadn't since I was a kid. And now this, now the warm sensation of him all around me, loving me. I tried to savor it as long as I could. Then, head still on his bare chest, I gathered my courage and spoke again. "Can I ask you something else?" I asked, finally breaking the moment. If I was going for it, I might as well really go for it.

"Of course," he said.

"Were you married to Diana?" I'd been pushing the idea around in my head for years, ever since I saw the picture at his mothers' house where he clearly wore a gold band on his left hand. He'd been married before, I knew it. When Diana showed up, and Frohike called her his "chickadee," I started doing the math. I didn't want to believe it, but I couldn't ignore it anymore.

I heard his pulse speed up and the slow rise and fall of his breath stop suddenly. "Not for long," he said. Hearing him say it hurt more than I'd expected it to. I tried to hold back a cringe. "We got married in Spring of 1990 and divorced not long before I met you."

I sucked in a breath. "What happened?"

"I got her pregnant. We worked together. We were in love. It seemed like the right thing to do," he admitted.

"Pregnant?"

"We'd been together for almost a year. We went down to the courthouse the week after she told me. It was no frills, just a civil ceremony." He paused and I listened to his racing heart. "She miscarried at 12 weeks, and things just weren't the same after that."

I instantly regretted bringing it up on this happy night. My heart ached for him, and as much as I disliked Diana, for her as well. "I'm so sorry."

I felt him nod. "It wasn't meant to be," he said.

I thought about how different his life would be with an 8 year old and a wife.

"I never would have had the X-files. I never would have had you," he continued.

"But a child, Mulder," I said, "losing an unborn child is still losing a child. I can't believe you never told me."

"I never told anyone," he said. "We just tried to pretend like it never happened. But, it was hard on both of us. I guess we just dealt with it in different ways."

"Did you want a baby?" I asked boldly.

"I was scared to death by the idea, but when there was one on the way I did, yeah. And then, there wasn't one." He sighed. "Our marriage was already disintegrating when we found the X-files. I started to think obsessively about my sister. I guess it was my way of dealing with what had happened. I disappeared into my work."

"And Diana?"

"She needed someone to take care of her, someone to comfort her. I just couldn't be there to do that. I threw myself into my work, and she found someone else who could give her what she needed."

"She cheated on you." I said tentatively.

"I don't know if it counts as cheating at that point. We weren't really in a marriage anymore, anyway. It felt more like a mercy killing. Putting our suffering relationship out of its misery. We filed for divorce. She took the transfer overseas, and I locked myself in the basement and started chasing little gray men. It was never malicious, never a fight. It was just the sad disillusion of a marriage that we shouldn't have entered into the first place."

"But you loved her?"

"Of course I did, Scully."

"I'm sorry," I said softly, not entirely sure what I was apologizing for, but feeling like it was the only thing I could say.

He reached out and took my hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. I let him pull me back into his embrace, our bare skin pressed against each other. He pressed a kiss to the top of my head as I curled deeper into his arms and rested my head on his warm body.

We sat in the quiet again as I contemplated all this new information. We'd crossed a permanent line. There was no way back after this, not with Mulder. I felt thrillingly terrified. It wasn't just the sex, it was the sharing, the emotion. I knew his truth and that couldn't be undone. It felt real in a way it never had before.

"Can I ask you a question?" he broke the silence.

"Of course."

I felt him take a deep breath of preparation and couldn't help but hold my own. "Did you know, that night? Our first time, I mean? Did you know that you couldn't…" It was a question he didn't even know how to finish, a question that I'd hoped he never ask.

"No," I quietly admitted. "I didn't find out until a few weeks after." I didn't tell him how meaningfully after. I didn't tell him that I'd found out about my missing ova as a direct result of that night. I couldn't. But, the moment played out in my mind again. I hated that it still hurt years later. I kept my head on his chest, unable to face him.

"Then why didn't we use protection?" he asked.

I tensed. I almost couldn't believe he'd had the nerve to say it. It was the exact thing I'd chastised myself for back then. How could you let this happen, Dr. Scully? You're a scientist, an educated woman, you should know better. You should have been prepared. I shook my head into him. "I don't know," I said softly. "Why didn't we?"

He traced his warm hand up the side of my arm. "I already knew, Scully," he admitted. "I mean not for sure, but I had an idea. I'd seen this before; I'd read the cases. I knew what they did." He paused. "I couldn't bring myself to ask you, not then." I began to gently rub his chest with my hand, to let him know I was there, I was listening, but I didn't know what to say. "What would you have done? I mean, if you gotten pregnant?" he asked.

Again, I questioned his gall. How did this man, naked on my couch, find the nerve to ask me these things? Of course, I'd thought about it. I'd thought about it for weeks. I'd thought about it all the way to the drugstore and back. I'd thought about it for two intense minutes while I waited for a blue line to seal my fate. I'd thought about it as I started to cry in my bathroom on a Thursday night in early December while the snow fell outside my window. I'd wept, not certain if these were tears of relief or tears of mourning for a baby that didn't exist, but I'd irrationally already started to love the thought of in my mind. As the thoughts played through my mind I felt like fool. The foolish feeling inside of me made me want to push him away. I couldn't control myself. "That's a useless question, Mulder. It doesn't matter."

He continued as if he hadn't even heard me. "I thought about it a lot," he admitted. "I thought about what I'd do, about what he'd look like."

I didn't know if I should punch him in the gut or break down in tears. I couldn't handle any more of this. I began to question my choice all together. Maybe I should have let him go home after baseball. Maybe this was all a mistake. I pulled away from him, curling in on myself to hide my body from him as I backed into a corner of the couch. "Stop it, Mulder. It doesn't matter anymore."

"Hey," he reached out to rest a hand on my knee tentatively. "I would have been honored, you know, to be the father of your baby." He paused to catch my eye. "If you ever decide that you want to try, regardless of what that might mean now," he said carefully, "I'm here for you. That's what I'm trying to say."

The anger drifted away. I savored his words, letting them roll around in my head, weighing them carefully and breaking down their deeper meanings. I'd never let myself think of his perspective in all of this. I'd never let myself consider the possibility that he'd been affected my by infertility, too. My conversations with Meg rolled through my mind. "Thank you," I said after a long pause.

He flipped over the hand on my knee to take my hand in his. He gave it a gentle squeeze. "I love you," he said.

It felt out of the blue. He didn't have to say it. He wasn't explaining himself. He wasn't drugged. This was the second time in one evening and I knew I couldn't dodge him again. I looked up into his hazel eyes and steeled myself. "I love you, too."


End file.
